Park Service missed out on $32M, review finds

The National Park Service missed out on as much as $32 million annually because of outdated entrance fees, a watchdog report found.

The Office of Inspector General (OIG) for the Interior Department found various missed opportunities in how park fees are charged to visitors, like parks not implementing a new fee model, out-of-date charges for commercial buses and liberal use of free passes.

{mosads}Simply implementing the Park Service’s 2006 fee model correctly would bring in another $28 million annually to the agency, OIG investigators wrote in a Friday report.

Agency officials put a moratorium on the new fee model in 2008.

“Due to the short time between the fee model implementation and the moratorium, only 24 out of 131 park units have put in place entrance fees commensurate with the fee model,” OIG wrote.

Investigators’ estimate of $28 million annually was based on what park service staff told them.

“We believe that NPS might realize even more revenue if it also updated this model to account for inflation,” OIG said.

The fee structure for commercial buses visiting parks has not been updated since 1998, despite the park service have the authority to update it regularly.

“Program management staff estimate that NPS could see about $4 million to $5 million in additional revenue by increasing commercial bus tour rates by roughly 30 percent,” the report said.

Among the other problems OIG found were that the difficulty of updating fees is likely to deter park managers from seeking updates and the agency hands out about 1 million free park passes a year to various groups.

During the course of the review, the Park Service ended the moratorium on the new fee structure in August, it told investigators.

It also implemented a new process for updating fees and launched an effort to increase bus charges.