Road Construction - Final Update for the Season

Monday, October 27 to Friday, October 31

Asphalt milling and patching is anticipated, weather dependent.
Road construction is scheduled Monday to Friday from sunrise to 6:00 P.M.
Twenty to thirty-minute delays are possible
*****

November 2014 to Spring 2015
Upon completion of the tasks above, the road will be ready for winter traffic.
Final paving is scheduled to occur in May, June and July 2015.

Photos from National Public Lands Day

Now that the busy summer volunteer season is over, we'll be posting a series on this blog featuring photos from the summer's activities. Our first in this series is from one of our most recent events: National Public Lands Day, at the end of September. Volunteers worked on projects all over the park for this annual event: taking down platform tents and doing some landscaping at Longmire, preparing trails for the winter season at Paradise, building bridges and water bars on the Wonderland Trail below Narada Falls, and planting native plants at Sunrise. Here are a few sample photos. More can be seen the park's Flickr page.

Taking down platform tents in the Longmire
Stewardship Campground

Volunteers head out to work on trails at Paradise

Washington Trails Association volunteers hard at
work on the Wonderland Trail

Revegetating the old Sunrise Campground on a
beautiful September day

Summer is Ending -NO!

Hard to believe summer has ended and meadow roving is slowing down.  This Sunday, October 5, will be the last day for Rovers at Sunrise.  The radios at the White River Wilderness Information Center will be returned to winter storage on Monday the 6th.  The following weekend will be the last for Paradise.  Sadly, my time will end on the Monday the 12th.  I wish to thank all of you for your dedication to keeping the meadows of Sunrise and Paradise from being loved to death.  I could not do the job without you!

One last project remains - to determine the Meadow Rover(s) of the Year.  For this, I need your nominations.  This award is not based solely on the number of hours, but also on the contributions these volunteers have made to educating the public and fellow rovers.  So send me your nominees-via the mora_meadow_rovers@nps.gov  with a brief description as to why you feel they are worthy of this honor.  I will need these by October 10th to allow time for a decision before the end of my season. 

Maureen McLean
Coordinator MORA Meadow Rovers

Tinkering under the hood: national VIP policies now available for public input

The National Park Service's Volunteers-in-Parks program is governed by a set of policies collectively called "Director's Order #7." This policy document is updated periodically to reflect current needs and issues. The last version was enacted almost ten years ago, in June of 2005. A new draft has just been released, and is now open for internal comment through November 10 and public comment through October 26. Here is the complete announcement from our national office (editorial clarifications added in [brackets]):

Memorandum

To:                   National Leadership Council

From:               Chief, Office of Policy

Subject:           Review of Director's Order #7:  Volunteers-in-Parks

The subject Director’s Order--which will supersede and replace the previous version approved by Director Mainella on June 13, 2005--is attached for your [internal] review and comment for a 45-day period, ending November 10, 2014.  

In FY 2012, 257,000 volunteers contributed 6.78 million hours of service to the National Park Service (NPS).  This contribution was valued at $21.79 per hour, for a total value of $148 million, equivalent to 3,260 FTEs.

This edition updates the 2005 Order as follows:

• The Volunteers-in-Parks program is now administered by the Associate Director, Interpretation and Education.
• Volunteer reimbursement procedures have been updated as a result of IRS audit findings and newly obtained information on volunteers and travel procedures, in such a way that reimbursements do not create tax liabilities for volunteers.
• NPS volunteer agreement forms have been eliminated and replaced with an interagency volunteer agreement form, OF 301A.
• HSPD-12 [Homeland Security Presidential Directive #12] information has been added with guidance for the conduct of background investigations.  Volunteer fee collectors operating a fee booth or station with a point-of-sales system will now be required to undergo an MBI background investigation.
• Qualified volunteers will now be allowed to apply pesticides.

The draft Order is the subject of a Federal Register notice published on September 26, 2014, inviting comment from the public for a 30-day period.

Joy Pietschmann, the Service-wide VIP Program Manager, will field any comments or questions about the attached Order.  She can be contacted at joy_pietschmann@nps.gov or 202-513-7141.

The draft Order is available online at:  

http://www.nps.gov/policy/Draft_DO7_2014.htm

For comparison, the existing (active) Director's Order can be found at http://www.nps.gov/policy/DOrders/DO-7.htm.