The History of the NPS

The National Park Service (NPS) is an organization with a rich heritage, filling an important place in U.S. history. If you are interested in learning more about the ideas behind the formation of the National Park Service, the people who supplied those ideas and the laws which shaped the NPS, you might enjoy this course from Eppley. It is available to both paid employees and volunteers.

The History of the NPS

The course explains the significance of major events in the history of the National Park Service, and touches on the key points of the Organic Act and the NPS Mission Statement. Check it out!

National service, volunteer vacations, and Junior Rangers

Several items caught my eye in the news this morning:

First, President Obama plans to sign the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act this afternoon, tripling the size of Americorps and setting a broad bipartisan priority for volunteerism in the coming years.

Second, an interesting article on MSNBC.com about "volunteer vacations," a growing trend among people who want to contribute in a positive way as part of their time away from work. Here at Mount Rainier, the Washington Trails Association's volunteer vacations are wildly popular each year, and our own volunteer program is working to develop regularly scheduled volunteer projects that would better lend themselves to people who want to plan ahead to participate.

And finally, an article about Junior Rangers, also in MSNBC. Not directly related to volunteerism, perhaps... but watch later today for a volunteer recruitment notice for someone to help with our own Junior Ranger programs here at Mount Rainier!

Meanwhile, from the recent mailbag:

• Articles about efforts to increase "green" practices and sustainability at Mount Rainier and other local parks, in WTA's Signpost Blog and The News Tribune;
• Word from the National Parks Traveler blog that the next Director of the National Park Service will be Jon Jarvis, currently the Pacific West Regional Director and previously Superintendent of Mount Rainier National Park; and
• Several volunteer positions being advertised in local national forests, including base camp managers and experiential education apprenticeships.

Coalition of Mount Rainier partners receives National Cooperative Conservation Award

A partnership among Mount Rainier National Park, the Student Conservation Association (SCA), the Washington’s Trails Association (WTA), the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), Washington’s National Park Fund, and The Mountaineers has won the 2008 Cooperative Conservation Award from the Department of the Interior, Park Superintendent Dave Uberuaga announced today. The ongoing partnership supports public volunteer efforts to rebuild damaged trails, campgrounds, and other facilities at Mount Rainier following the devastating floods and windstorms of November and December 2006.

The Cooperative Conservation Award is Interior’s highest award presented to private citizens and organizational partners who support the agency’s mission and demonstrate significant contributions to its programs. Secretary of the Interior Kempthorne will present the award at a ceremony in Washington, D.C., on April 21, 2008.

“This award justly recognizes the commitment of our partners, and the critical role they played in our flood recovery efforts,” said Uberuaga. “It also acknowledges the huge number of deeply committed individuals and community groups who worked through those partnerships to support the park.”

Twenty other partnerships will be recognized nationwide, including four others with the National Park Service. The Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative is the only program to be honored from the state of Washington.

The Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative, led by the Student Conservation Association, worked with park supervisors to identify and prepare recovery projects, placed a 14-member Conservation Corps within the park, and recruited and led additional teams of public volunteers. More than 700 people from all over the country participated, rebuilding the Wonderland Trail, restoring habitats, campgrounds and historic structures, carrying supplies to backcountry project locations, patrolling trails and assisting park visitors. The recovery initiative was part of a larger volunteer effort involving 1,724 people who contributed 84,038 hours of service at Mount Rainier National Park in 2007, an effort valued at almost $1.6 million.

“SCA is honored to share in this award and pleased to serve Mount Rainier National Park,” said SCA Regional Vice President Jay A. Satz. “We are further gratified by the tremendous volunteer support provided by so many organizations and individuals. Together, we succeeded in meeting the urgent needs of this iconic park and created a new model for collaborative conservation.”

The five non-profit award winners also formed the Northwest Parks and Public Lands Storm Recovery Coalition after the 2006 floods, to support recovery efforts by sharing resources and coordinating efforts among its member organizations. Their contributions to Mount Rainier’s recovery were significant. Through a grant from Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI), WTA recruited and led 275 volunteers on trail construction projects around the park. NPCA led efforts to generate public and political support for the park’s recovery efforts, and took the lead in organizing major events like National Trails Day and National Public Lands Day. The Fund provided substantial financial support for the partnership with SCA and coordinated fundraising efforts. The Mountaineers committed their large membership and historical standing in the community.

“NPCA is flattered to share this award with our coalition members,” said Sean Smith, NPCA’s Regional Director. “Yet, it truly belongs to the thousands of people who volunteered to contact their elected officials, donate money and supplies, and repair and restore the damage.”

The Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative, with all of its groundbreaking partnerships, will continue in 2008. Flood recovery efforts are ongoing, and volunteers continue to play important roles in the day-to-day protection of park resources and service to park visitors. SCA and the Coalition continue to help through recruitment of volunteer, financial, and political support. Following this winter’s devastating storms on the Olympic Peninsula, they have expanded their mission to support recovery efforts throughout the region, following the model so successfully pioneered at Mount Rainier.

For further information about Mount Rainier National Park’s volunteer program, including ways to get involved in the coming year and links to partner websites, visit the park’s homepage at ww.nps.gov/mora or this volunteer program blog.

For further information about our partners, please visit:
Student Conservation Association: http://www.thesca.org/
NW Parks & Public Lands Storm Recovery Coalition: nwstormrecoverycoalition.blogspot.com
National Parks Conservation Association: http://www.npca.org/
Washington Trails Association: http://www.wta.org/
Washington’s National Park Fund: http://www.wnpf.org/
The Mountaineers: http://www.mountaineers.org/

-NPS-

Tough hike

Meanwhile, back in the real world, this activity report from one of our volunteers patroling the Carbon River corner of the park--a typical day in the forest for such volunteers:

Activity Report, Saturday, March 8, 2008, Green Lake

It’s still a tough hike to Green Lake. Conditions will vary depending on surface temperature, of course, and today the snow was mostly firm enough to support me without snowshoes. I carried them to GL and back today. Of course when that’s the case the surface can be slippery. That’s the tradeoff. I love my Yaktrac’s.

I cleared 5 inches of snow and ice from the foot bridge. There is at least 3 feet of snow in GL pass. Currently the snow level places the hiker around 4-1/2 feet above footbridge level. I cut in and compacted some steps down to the footbridge on both sides. They probably won’t last very long, though.

There’s another old growth down a short distance above the other one. Both are on the switchbacks above RF. This one you can crawl under, but I still need to cut the switchback in order to get around the other. Lots of smaller trees are down, including one at the RF overlook and one on the spur to the overlook. Also, there’s more debris on trail than I can remember from past years.

Only one set of prints made it to GL recently. He lost the trail below GL pass but managed to find the pass and re-set. Somehow he made it over the OG. Don’t know how; it’s chest high, on a 15 degree angle and slippery.

Snow begins shortly after the washout and builds to around 1-1/2 feet at GLTH. In a few places it has melted along the edge of the road so that you can avoid it. Otherwise it’s an ankle tester.

Plenty of visitors today, and some new tracks after mine on the lower part of GL trail, but I didn’t see the visitors. Probably just too much work for them.

George Coulbourn

Blogging from San Francisco

I'm back in San Francisco this week, helping to present volunteer program training at Golden Gate National Recreation Area. This is a training exercise as well, as we'll be offering the same training at Mount Rainier at the end of May (on the 28th and 29th). Unfortunately, I've secumbed to a virus of some kind, and have spent the second day of training laid up in bed feeling miserable while the others in our group meet on the waterfront near Fort Point, with a magnificent view of the Golden Gate Bridge under sunny skies and 65 degree temperatures! Oh well.

Tomorrow evening I head home... but first, my fellow volunteer program managers and I will spend the morning reviewing applications for Special Project Funding in support of volunteer programs throughout the Pacific West Region of the National Park Service. There are some very creative ideas out there--community VIP coordinators, oral history projects, paleontology interns, tribal partnerships--as well as a lot of well-deserving everyday needs--radios, rain gear, fleece vests, and backpacks. I look forward to reading through the proposals. From here, our top 10 projects will go to the national level, where some of them will hopefully get funded. The rest will return to our region, and we'll fund as many of the ones that are left as we can. Ultimately, we're talking about $158,102 for 30 projects in our region, any one of which would provide tremendous benefits for our parks through partnerships with volunteers. It's too bad we can't fund them all!

Mean- while, I'm working on a press release about our Cooper- ative Conser- vation Award; writing grant proposals; and working with my SCA counterpart, Jill Baum, to plan this summer's volunteer program. We have the first draft of a training schedule, so that should be ready to release soon. We've lined up funding and made job offers for ten Conservation Corps members who will work with supervisors throughout the park to organize volunteer projects. We're beginning to put together a calendar of activities for the summer--that should be ready to release soon, too. And we're already getting lots of calls and e-mails from people anxious to put those projects on their calendars. We'll try to get specifics to you as soon as possible. We appreciate your support!

Other award winners

I got a list of the other Cooperative Conservation Award winners. Congratulations to all of them!

• Southwestern Bald Eagle Management Committee (BIA Arizona)
• East Bay Protection Working Group (FWS Texas)
• Matanuska-Susitna Salmon Habitat Conservation Partnership (FWS Alaska)
• Northern Forest Woodcock Initiative (FWS New York)
• Penobscot River Restoration Trust (FWS Maine)
• Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program and San Juan River Basin Recovery Implementation Program (FWS Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming)
• Mark A. Benedict (NPS Florida)
• Great Northern Environmental Stewardship Area (NPS Montana)
• Hooper Bay Alaska Subsistence ATV Trail Project Partnership (NPS Alaska)
• Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative of the Student Conservation Association (NPS Washington)
• Tavita Togia (NPS American Samoa)
• Alabama Hills Stewardship Group (BLM California)
• Animas River Watershed (BLM Colorado)
• Jupiter Inlet Working Group (BLM Florida)
• Milsap Mill Tailings Restoration Partnership (BLM Colorado)
• Restore New Mexico Partnership (BLM New Mexico)
• Willamette River Water Trail Partnership (BLM Oregon)
• University of Alaska Coastal Marine Institute/MMS Environmental Studies Program (MMS Alaska)
• Lower Colorado River Multi-Species Conservation Program (BOR Arizona)
• Sparta Aquifer Recovery (USGS Arkansas and Louisiana)
• Upper San Pedro Partnership (USGS Arizona)

Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative receives Cooperative Conservation Award!

I was making a final check of my e-mail at work about noon today, on my way out the door to go to a doctor's appointment, when I received a message titled, ambiguously, "Fw: Cooperative Conservation Awards Ceremony." The message had been forwarded three times before it got to me, with discussion about "who's going to attend?" and "who's going to pay for it?" My curiosity rising, I finally reached the original message, which reads in part as follows:

"As we discussed last week, I am in the process of sending out letters to the recipients of the Cooperative Conservation Awards. I need to know who the recipients are who will be attending the ceremony. The ceremony will be held on April 21, 2008, at 3:00 pm in the Main Interior Building. There will be a reception following the ceremony. There will also be a two-day workshop on April 22 and 23, 2008 for the recipients. The workshop will feature award winners sharing their experiences. Each recipient will give a 10 minute presentation and a chance to answer questions about their projects. I need project pictures (at least 15) from each project. We also need the correct spelling of the names of each recipient. Listed are the spelling of the names that will go on the certificates. If there are any changes, please let me know.

"I also need to know the name of the individual who will be accepting the award from the Secretary. Everyone that attends may go up on stage, however, only one will speak for the group and accept the award."

The names listed below the e-mail are:

National Park of American Samoa, National Park Service

• Tavita Togia

Mount Rainier Initiative

Student Conservation Association

• Jill Baum
• David Critton
• Willie Ehrenclou
• Jay Satz

Mount Rainier National Park, National Park Service

• Kevin Bacher
• Randy King
• Dave Uberuaga

The Mountaineers

• Gina Ottoboni

National Parks Conservation Association

• Sean Smith

Washington's National Park Fund

• Eleanor Kittelson

Washington Trails Association

• Lauren Braden

So, I haven't gotten the official letter yet, but it's clear that our volunteer program--in partnership with the Student Conservation Association and the Northwest Parks and Public Lands Storm Recovery Coalition--has been selected to receive one of the Department of Interior's prestigious Cooperative Conservation Award! "Everyone that attends may go up on stage," says the e-mail. I'm sure they're referring to the members of our coalition... but they're just representatives of the 1,724 people who actually volunteered their time on the ground in the park, of course. Can you imagine 1,724 people coming up on stage to accept an award from the Secretary of the Interior?!

Whoever ends up having that honor will do so, explictly, on your behalf.

By the way, the timing of this is really good. The Student Conservation Association is already hosting a Conservation Summit in Washington D.C. from April 24 to 27, called "Earth Vision: Actions for a Healthy Planet." Many of us are already planning to attend. From there, it's just a short hop across the Mall to the Interior Building...

Digging out Paradise

The News Tribune has a great collection of photos from our recent efforts to dig out after two weeks of heavy snow. Check out the complete set on their website at www.thenewstribune.com/944/story/284479.html.

The world-wide spread of our volunteer program

Mount Rainier volunteers, hello! Cheers, Aloha, Bonjour, Konnichiwa, and Здравствуйте!

Preparing to mail our Mount Rainier Recovery posters to almost 1400 addresses, it's been fascinating to me to see how widespread our volunteer program is. It's concentrated in the Puget Sound area, of course, but we have many, many volunteers in eastern Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, Hawaii, and points even further away. We have volunteers in Canada... Japan... the United Kingdom... and Slovakia.

With the magic of Google Maps, I was able to plot the distribution of our volunteer program online. Check out the full data at http://maps.google.com/?mid=1203463084. Here's a few screenshots, too. The one at the top of this post shows our world-wide volunteers. Clearly, we need to make some inroads into the southern hemisphere, including Africa, South America, and Australia. I volunteer to make a recruiting trip!

The second map shows our U.S. distribution. That's 37 states, plus U.S. Military and the District of Columbia. We're still missing Alaska, Alabama, Kentucky, Maine, Missouri, Mississippi, Montana, New Jersey, Nevada, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Dakota, and West Virginia. If you have relatives in those states, invite them to come spend a week volunteering with us this summer!

Our greatest concentrations of volunteers, of course, are close to home. The third map shows Washington and northern Oregon, with lots of volunteer markers engulfing Puget Sound, and stretching out along the highways into the Willamette Valley, Columbia Basin, High Desert, and Olympic Coast. Looks like lots of you could work at North Cascades or Olympic National Parks just as easily as here.

Wherever you're from, thanks for coming here! (Arigato, Merci, and благодарю Вас!)

A very successful poster party

The poster party on Saturday was a resounding success! Twenty-seven volunteers showed up (I was expecting 15), many of them as much as half an hour early. I'd barely unlocked the doors of the Education Center when people were already busy rolling and stuffing poster tubes. Despite the obvious organizational challenges, everything went very smoothly. It took a grand total of 5 hours, including a break for lunch, to roll, stuff, label, and sort about 1400 poster tubes! We sent boxes and boxes of tubes with people, to drop off at Postnet in Eatonville on their way home. Now it's Postnet's problem! They expect to get the posters to the store in Puyallup and on their way in the mail over the course of this week, so I expect most people will receive them next week.

Meanwhile, I am immensely grateful for all the help, and impressed (as I always am) by the initiative, creativity, resourcefulness, and can-do spirit of our volunteers.

Here's some pictures from the event:

Hard at work rolling and stuffing posters

The extra-challenging multiple poster mailers

Sorting and bundling poster tubes by zip code

Poster tubes sorted by zip code, waiting to be bundled
and packed into boxes for transport to the Post Office

Ready to stuff poster tubes!

At long last, our commemorative posters are ready to be mailed! About 15 or so people are planning to rendezvous tomorrow at 11am at Mount Rainier's Education Center to roll posters and stuff them into poster tubes.

If any of you find yourself in the position of organizing such a mass mailing, you have my sympathies! Here are some of the challenges:

• Creating an organized mailing list. We have volunteers who've participated this past year directly through Mount Rainier National Park, and others who've contributed through the Student Conservation Association, Washington Trails Association, National Parks Conservation Association, and Washington's National Park Fund. Each has its own list of names in its own format.
• Eliminating duplicates. How do you find duplicates in a list combined from multiple sources, when one list might say "Mr. and Mrs. John Doe, 1141 Main St. SE" and the next list says "Jane and John Doe, 1141 S.E. Main Street"?
• Tracking down missing addresses. For many of our volunteers, we had phone numbers or e-mail addresses, but not mailing addresses. These had to be contacted individually to get the necessary information.
• Confirming and correcting addresses. Many of our records are out of date--especially those for volunteers who've worked for us for many years, or who are transitory because of enrollment in school, seasonal jobs, or retirement.
• What to do about groups? Many people came to Mount Rainier as part of organized groups: employee groups at REI and Starbucks, Boy Scout and Girl Scout Troops, classes at The Evergreen State College, groups from Audubon Expeditions Institute and the Tacoma Urban League, just to name a few. We usually have contact information for only the group leader. For each of these groups, we had three options: send a batch of posters to the group leader for distribution; have the group send me a list of names and addresses so we could mail the posters directly; or just send a poster to put up in the offices of the sponsoring organization. We have some of all three options on our mailing list.
• Where to get mailing tubes? Not counting posters we can deliver by hand, we have about 1400 addresses on our list! That's a big order of poster tubes, and you can't just go down to the local office supply store and pick up that many tubes. After considering multiple options, we went with a company based in Missouri that has a contract with the Government Services Administration and had 18"x2" poster tubes on sale for 59 cents each. A darn good price.
• How do you ship that many poster tubes? We needed to receive them by today, of course. That wasn't a problem for the company we bought the tubes from, but then they called us back and said that, due to the large order, they needed to be delivered someplace with a loading dock. That meant Longmire rather than the Education Center. But then they had trouble arranging for someone to actually deliver the tubes to Longmire... so in the end, we were rescued by our own warehouse manager, David Gunderson, who picked them all up in Kent when he did his weekly town run yesterday. The up side to all of this is that we got a large break on the shipping costs, and they even threw in a 2 cents apiece discount for our bulk order!
• How on Earth do you mail 1400 poster tubes? Our little post office here in Ashford has never done such a thing before... and if you've never done bulk mailing, you should check out the regulations on the USPS website and see if you can interpret them! I've never seen more undefined acronyms and confusing cross-references. With the help of our sharp mailing expert here in the park, Mika Moore, we finally figured out that we needed to apply for a bulk mailing permit, get mailing bags from the post office in Puyallup, and sort everything by zip code. But meanwhile, I called the brand new PostNet business in Eatonville, and they offered to do the bulk mail for us, using their own permit for a fee, which was cheaper than buying our own anyway. They even printed labels for us. (We'll still need to sort by zip code.)
• How do you write a thank you letter for a coalition of six different partners (NPS, SCA, WTA, NPCA, WNPF, and The Mountaineers)? At first, we were going to have separate letters for each mailing list... but it would have been a real headache to try to figure out which letter went with which poster, and besides, many of you participated multiple times and with multiple groups. So in the end, we finally agreed on a single letter, signed by everyone. Then the challenge was to compile signatures from everyone...

So now all of that's done, we have 16 boxes of poster tubes waiting to be opened and filled with several boxes worth of posters, I have a stack of mailing labels ready to stick on, and I've been printing thank you letters 100 at a time all afternoon so as not to burn up our printer!

Recruiting and organizing the volunteers to actually do the poster stuffing is the easy part!

Now, we have a huge job, but lots of people coming to help; I don't know how long the project will take, but we may finish early. Here's a thought for afterward:

The road to Paradise will not open until at least Sunday... so we're offering our free guided snowshoe walks at Longmire instead on Saturday. They'll be at 12:30 and 2:30 at least, and possibly more often. And, the weather forecast looks good, so consider coming prepared to play in the snow after the rolling, stuffing, and labeling is finished! We have about 6 feet of snow on the ground at Longmire right now.

See you all tomorrow!

Paradise Area Projected to Reopen Sunday, February 17

Mount Rainier National Park Superintendent Dave Uberuaga advises that the road to Paradise will remain closed at least until Sunday, February 17. The road has been closed to the public since February 7 when the heavy snowfall in the Cascades increased the avalanche hazard to the point that it was extremely difficult to keep the road safely open. At that time, Paradise had 189 inches of snow on the ground and continued heavy snow, followed by a wet, warming trend further increased the avalanche danger.

Over the weekend more than 10 natural avalanches released depositing heavy, dense snow in several areas between Longmire and Paradise. The park’s Road Crew began the slow task of removing the avalanche debris along with the new snow that had accumulated(up to 10 feet in some locations). Throughout the week they have continued to blow and plow snow to clear the roadways, the parking areas, pullouts and provide access to buildings. Other Maintenance personnel spent the week shoveling the deep snow from buildings, accessways, water and sewer plants, and hydrants and other facilities that have been buried.

Snow removal and cleanup will continue today, as well as getting the snowplay area groomed and ready for use. The last remaining hurdle is a satisfactory water supply test, which has to be confirmed by the State of Washington before reopening to the public can occur. We expect that confirmation on Saturday.

The park will be open to Longmire on Saturday. The National Park Inn is open with lodging, food, a gift shop and ski and snowshoe rentals. Snowshoe walks will be led in Longmire by NPS staff at 12:30 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. Sign up at the Longmire Museum.

Businesses in the gateway communities outside the park will be open as well.

With a good weather forecast for this weekend, it should be a beautiful winter weekend at Mount Rainier!

-NPS-

Note: For more details and some great pictures of the heavy snow at Paradise, check out Mike Gauthier's Mount Rainier Climbing Blog.

Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative to offer new programs for volunteers

Seattle, Washington, February 13, 2008 – The Student Conservation Association’s (SCA) Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative had a very successful first year in 2007 and is now planning for 2008.

Following devastating floods in November 2006, “SCA responded by fielding 80 diverse young people in the park this summer to help rebuild washed-out trails, repair damaged campgrounds, restore vulnerable habitats, and supervise over 700 volunteers,” said Congressman Norm Dicks.

“Congratulations to SCA for its long legacy of public land conservation and, in particular, for the outstanding support in the recovery of Mount Rainier National Park.”

This year’s goal is to continue engaging as many public volunteers as possible, emphasizing groups, youth groups, organizations, and returning individuals. Program Director Jill Baum and Mount Rainier National Park Volunteer Program Manager Kevin Bacher will guide this process.

SCA will offer wilderness and project management training sessions beginning in mid-May to park staff and interested community volunteers, with an emphasis on public training opportunities in July and August. Training will include risk management, Wilderness First Aid/CPR, Wilderness First Responder (through SCA’s partner Aerie School of Backcountry Medicine), volunteer management (through NPS), team building, Meadow Rover orientation, Leave No Trace, search and rescue procedures, natural and cultural history, and, of course, traditional conservation work skills.

“The National Park Service has had a long-standing partnership with the Student Conservation Association and we are excited to offer our volunteers some new training opportunities,” said Mount Rainier National Park Superintendent Dave Uberuaga.

“Getting back to work again this year is an exciting prospect,” said Jay A. Satz, Regional Vice President for SCA. “There are plenty of opportunities to get needed conservation work done on the ground but also to offer volunteers a way to become even more engaged with their public lands, including becoming trainers themselves and advocating on behalf of our treasured national parks.”

Beginning in May, SCA will place 4 - 6 volunteers directly into key park programs. They will coordinate and lead volunteer projects in the areas of trail construction, meadow restoration, greenhouse management, interpretation, natural resource monitoring, cultural resource restoration, and maintenance.

Other SCA corps members will serve as a “response team” and will lead public volunteers and assist the staff of the park. SCA will again field high school teams, especially through the Seattle urban high school program, as well as Conservation Interns.

The park and SCA are also looking forward to working side by side again with members of the Northwest Storm Recovery Coalition, including the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), Washington Trails Association (WTA) and Washington’s National Park Fund in support of year two of the Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative.

# # #

About SCA
The Student Conservation Association (SCA) is a nationwide conservation force of college and high school volunteers who protect and restore America’s parks, forests, and other public lands. For more than 50 years, SCA’s active, hands-on approach to conservation has helped to develop a new generation of conservation leaders, inspire lifelong stewardship, and save our planet.

For more information, visit: http://www.thesca.org/

For more information about the volunteer program at Mount Rainier National Park, go to: www.nps.gov/mora or rainiervolunteers.blogspot.com.

For more information on the NW Parks and Public Lands Storm Recovery Coalition and the member organizations, go to: nwstormrecoverycoalition.blogspot.com

-NPS-

Boeing gives $93,550 to support Washington National Parks

Funding Aids Student Conservation Association, other organizations in ongoing storm recovery

Seattle, Washington, February 11, 2008 – Boeing has awarded $93,550 to the Student Conservation Association (SCA), Washington Trails Association (WTA) and National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) to support the organizations’ continuing flood recovery activities at Mount Rainier National Park. Boeing gave the grant as part of the company’s commitment to environmental and civic engagement.

The grant will be distributed among the organizations to support volunteer citizen stewardship programs and public outreach and education. Each organization is focused on continuing to collaborate with Mount Rainier National Park on projects that are part of recovery efforts from the 2006 winter storms. 2007 was a successful year for the Park: it reopened to the public, many trails and campgrounds were repaired, and volunteer participation almost doubled, but the season ended with more work to be done. Mount Rainier National Park and this coalition of partner organizations are now planning for 2008, and the Boeing grant will help to fund their activities.

“Last summer, Mount Rainier and SCA’s Mount Rainier Recovery Initiative made significant progress in restoring public access to the park by reopening and rebuilding trails,” said Jay A. Satz, Vice President for Western Initiatives with SCA. “This generous grant from Boeing will support the continued efforts of SCA and other coalition members to repair more of the damage caused by recent severe storms and to build on Mount Rainier Superintendent Dave Uberuaga’s commitment to engage the public in the stewardship of the park over the long term.”

SCA will use $43,550 of the grant to support summer programs at Mount Rainier National Park, including programs to work with urban high school students in the Seattle area on restoration projects. SCA will work with public volunteers to reconstruct trails and bridges, control erosion and invasive plants, and restore damaged sites. The funding will also support public training in conservation skills to further develop a sustainable volunteer program at Mount Rainier.

With $25,000 from the grant, NPCA will host town hall and conference events to discuss how the federal government can sustain long-term access to national parks as recurring storm damage increasingly limits public access. NPCA will also redesign the Storm Coalition web site, conduct a media tour and recruit volunteers for projects to repair trails, restore bridges, clean campgrounds and remove invasive species.

“We thank Boeing for its commitment to the national parks of the Northwest,” said NPCA’s Northwest Regional Director Sean Smith. “Under-funded parks have a tough time responding to the sorts of disasters that may become more frequent with climate change, and NPCA looks forward to providing public education and leading volunteer efforts to ensure that our parks remain accessible to all Americans.”

WTA will use $25,000 of the funds to station a crew leader at Mount Rainier National Park. The crew leader will lead three trail repair work parties each week throughout the spring and summer to survey and repair storm damage.

“Having a WTA crew leader on the ground at Mount Rainier for another season is the difference between restoring public access to some of these trails, or letting them remain out of reach for yet another season,” said Lauren Braden, Communications Director for WTA. “The damage done to local trails from recent storms was unprecedented, and it will continue to take a lot of helping hands to put our public lands back together. There are many opportunities to do just that by volunteering for a day of trail maintenance with WTA or one of our coalition partners.”

# # #

About SCA
The Student Conservation Association SCA is a nationwide conservation force of college and high school volunteers who protect and restore America’s parks, forests, and other public lands. For more than 50 years, SCA’s active, hands-on approach to conservation has helped to develop a new generation of conservation leaders, inspire lifelong stewardship, and save our planet.

For more information, visit: http://www.thesca.org/

About NPCA
National Parks Conservation Association’s mission is to protect and enhance America’s National Park System for present and future generations. NPCA plays a crucial role in ensuring that these special places are protected in perpetuity by: advocating for the national parks and the National Park Service; educating decision-makers and the public about the importance of preserving the parks; helping to convince members of Congress to uphold the laws that protect the parks and in support of new legislation to address threats to the parks; fighting attempts to weaken these laws in the courts; and assessing the health of the parks and park management to better inform our advocacy work.

For more information, visit: http://www.npca.org/

About WTA
Washington Trails Association is the voice for hikers in Washington State. WTA protects hiking trails and wild lands, takes thousands of volunteers out to maintain trails, and promotes hiking as a healthy, fun way to explore Washington. Perhaps you've stumbled upon us on a hiking trail, donning hardhats, wielding shovels, keeping your trail in great shape. WTA's volunteer trail maintenance program is among the largest in the nation, with over 1750 volunteers "giving back" to the trails they love every year and getting a good dose of personal reward in return. WTA also protects trails through lobbying and grassroots advocacy on issues that impact hikers, like trail funding and wilderness protection. We work closely with federal and state policymakers to advance hiker's interests in forest planning and new recreation projects.

For more information, visit: http://www.wta.org/

For more information about the volunteer program at Mount Rainier National Park, go to: www.nps.gov/mora or rainiervolunteers.blogspot.com.

For more information on the NW Parks and Public Lands Storm Recovery Coalition and the member organizations, go to: nwstormrecoverycoalition.blogspot.com

-NPS-

Paradise Road closed by snow avalanches

Notes from the park's Management Team meeting today:

"Warmer weather and rain on Friday and Saturday triggered natural avalanches at Christine Hairpin (10-15' deep) [just below the Comet Falls trailhead], 4 avalanche chutes on Glacier Hill [just above the Nisqually bridge], and other places along the road (a total of 10-15 events). At Glacier Hill there is about 300 yards of road buried, unsure of depth. At Paradise there is 5-6 feet of snow in the upper parking lot. The road crew did not go out on Saturday due to extreme avalanche danger. They began clearing the road Saturday and have gotten as far as Glacier Hill. They are awaiting additional rental equipment, including bulldozer which arrived this afternoon. They hope to reach Paradise by the end of the week, but it is unlikely that the road will open in time for the holiday weekend.

"The heavy snowis also causing damage to some buildings, including the stack on the boiler for the auto shop and a number of window panes.

"There was also a planning meeting this afternoon on the avalanche situation and contingency plans for the weekend. Tomorrow morning three rangers will ski up to Paradise from Glacier Bridge to do an assessment of the condition of the road, further avalanche danger, and whether snowmobiles could make the trip, and to fix the weather station. We're checking into renting snowmobiles from Enumclaw (the ones the park owns may not be suitable for this type of terrain). Goal is to get some essential staff up to Paradise on snowmobiles to check utilities. We're still working on getting WASDOT to come out and assist us with an assessment of the road and if the slides and generally diminished avalanche danger have abated our problem enough to reopen. It is very likely the road will not open this weekend. Park will contact registered group campers and tell them this. We will not make alternate provisions such as opening Cougar Rock to group camping, because there are no toilets there and because it would mean diverting some of road crew from road opening. We'll offer snowshoe walks at Longmire. Press release is going out today to update public about likely continuing road closure."

Poster mailing party confirmed for February 16

Thank you to all of you who have contacted me over the past few weeks to confirm your mailing address for our commemorative poster, recognizing the efforts of those who participated as volunteers over the past year! We are tidying up a few loose ends on our mailing list and awaiting our order of poster tubes, but are otherwise ready to begin putting the posters in the mail. With about 1400 addresses to send them to, however, we will clearly need some assistance, mostly rolling posters and putting them in the poster tubes.

So, please consider joining us for a poster mailing party! This will be a great opportunity to see your friends and fellow volunteers, and to make new friends with others who have participated at Mount Rainier National Park... and, of course, to get some work done at the same time. Here are the details:

WHO: Everyone is welcome. If you didn't volunteer last summer, come join us, learn about the volunteer program, and earn a poster for your efforts!

WHERE: Mount Rainier National Park Education Center: 55210 238th Ave E, Ashford, WA 98304 ("Tahoma Woods"; click the link for directions). To reach the Education Center, drive straight back, past the park headquarters building, through the gate, then curve left at the clearing to park by the Education Center. If it's very snowy, you can also park at park headquarters and walk 200 yards to the Education Center.

WHEN: 11:00 a.m. Saturday, February 16, until 5pm or we finish, whichever comes first! Late arrivals are fine if you can't come for the whole day.

BRING: Bring your own sack lunch (microwaves are available), and a snack or desert to share.

TAKE HOME: Your own Mount Rainier Recovery commemorative poster! See our earlier entry for details.

RSVP: Please let me know if you plan to come, so I have some idea of how large a group to expect. But drop-ins are also welcome!

QUESTIONS: If you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me, or call me at 360-569-2211 ext. 3385.

See you in a few weeks!

Poster mailing party tentatively 2/16

We're zeroing in on a date for mailing our commemorative posters, and it looks likely that it'll be February 16, at the park headquarters in Tahoma Woods, between Ashford and Elbe. I'll confirm this in the next day or two and send out an e-mail to everyone who offered to help, but meanwhile you can pencil the date on your calendar, with a start time of around 11am.

Thank you to all of you who answered my queries to confirm your addresses! Tracking them all down has been quite a task!

By the way, I thought you might like to see what Longmire looks like these days:

Welcoming Rebecca Agiewich

From Mike Gauthier, Supervisory Climbing Ranger:

"Two new faces are in and out of the Longmire Administration building these days...

"Our new face is Rebecca Agiewich. Rebecca is a novelist, journalist and blogger who writes for the Seattle PI, Seattle Magazine, and the Lonely Planet. Her novel, BreakupBabe sprang out of a blog (of the same name) and was published in 2006. Rebecca also teaches classes about writing and blogging. In 1991, she hiked the Wonderland Trail and has since climbed, skied and snowshoed many other trails in the park. Formally at Microsoft and Amazon, she'll be writing more about Mount Rainier for the Seattle PI’s 'Getaways' section.

"While VIP-ing at Mount Rainier, Rebecca will help the climbing program expand its on-line content and information services. You can find her on the first floor of the Longmire Administration building in Dave Ashe's old office. For more information on Rebecca, check out her author website at www.RebeccaAgiewich.com or her personal site where she writes about fashion, music, romance and outdoor activities: http://houseofsparkle.blogspot.com ."

Welcome, Rebecca!

Mount Rainier Recovery Poster is ready to mail!

At long last, the Mount Rainier Recovery poster is complete and has arrived! Along with the park's partners, I am putting the finishing touches on our mailing list of volunteers who contributed to the park in 2007 and late 2006. We're drafting thank you letters to go with the posters, and looking for the most economical source of mailing tubes.

If you volunteered in 2007, you will probably be getting an e-mail or call from me in the near future, confirming your address and checking on your availability to help with a massive poster stuffing and mailing party, most likely in early February.

It's exciting to finally have this poster complete, and to have one more opportunity to thank all of you for your tremendous contributions over the past year, in the wake of 2006's devastating floods! We look forward to continuing the good work in 2008.

The poster, by the way, was produced by Ranger Doug's Enterprises, who donated all of their design work for free and then sold us the posters at a drastically reduced cost. We are deeply grateful for their contribution! The poster measures 18x24 inches... so get those frames ready!

(1/18 update: I've updated the image with an electronic version of the poster. Same image, better quality than my photograph!)

Activity Report, Sunday, January 13, 2008, Green Lake

Flash beat me in and was already greeting the early visitors. After a chat I headed to GL. Several inches of snow at the washout became 5 inches at GLTH. A few visitors have gone as far as RF since the snow, but there were no tracks above. I again needed snowshoes above RF. The snow had a hard crust that you drop through to mid calf or deeper today. I heard Geoff call in a report that the road heading up to Paul Peak was in bad shape.

There is a newly fallen old growth hemlock across the trail midway up to RF. It’s in the same area as numerous other large windfalls. I could duck under it, but in order to do so it’s necessary also to straddle a smaller tree directly underneath. If I can duck under a tree, anyone can; but not everyone could get over the smaller one easily. I expect that Carl will leave the large one in place for now. There also are several small trees across the trail blocking below RF.

At the RF lookout, a tree made a direct hit. The right side rail is broken. It may be useable temporarily if the broken end is trimmed. The tree currently lies across the lookout platform. I could duck under it.

On the second set of switchbacks above RF, there’s another old growth hemlock across the trail completely blocking. No way over and no easy way around especially with the steep hillside and deep snow currently in the area. It’s close to the spot where a similar old growth tree fell a couple of years ago. After scouting above and below trail, I decided to try a route from below. No real problem on snowshoes, but I had to back-step heading down, because of the steepness of the slope.

I cleared 14 inches of snow from GLFB. Not all that difficult, since no one had crossed the FB since the snow. I doubt there will be many visitors until the snow melts. It’s a bit of work even with snowshoes and the blocking tree makes for an adventure.

Over two feet of snow with a hard crust at GL.

There were 6 trees across the road from the washout to GLTH, 3 large and 3 small. All but one of the trees was blocking. I met Eva on the way out. She was returning from a hike to Chenuis. She advised that Flash, Geoff and Matt were clearing the trees in the road ahead. They cleared most of them and were wrapping up when I arrived.

Lots of families on the road, overflow parking in our tiny CRE lot, and a steady stream of Lookie Lou’s out for a drive on a nice day.

George Coulbourn