By Matthew Amelung
The existence of public parks for our enjoyment is often
taken for granted. With a host of public parks at the local, state, and
national levels, citizens have a multitude of options for recreation. Yet, with
increasing financial pressures and subsequent budget cuts at all levels of
government, the existence of these recreational opportunities is coming under
fire, much like many other government-funded programs.
At the state level, massive cuts to public parks are being
made to keep the system afloat. California’s woes are a prime example of this
defunding. Its Department of Parks and Recreation cut $22 million of its parks
budget from 2009-2011, leading to the closure of 70 of the state’s 278 parks by
July 2011 (Sankin, 2012).
These cuts are likely to continue unless some sort of
alternative solution is found. One such policy reform quietly taking shape is
public parks privatization. Beckwith (1981) defines public parks privatization
in the following way: “For our purposes, it will be assumed that public ownership
of parks will continue and that privatization entails the contracting out of
support services to private firms operating for profit. By contracting out, the
governmental unit has not shed its responsibilities for providing park
services. It has, rather, by means of traditional contract-law principles,
allocated its tax revenues to a low-bidding private firm rather than to its own
employees.”
To some degree, this type of privatization has already been
happening for a number of years. Many public parks have sub-contracted certain
aspects of the parks systems – concessions, for instance – out to for-profit
firms to manage. In California, 200
for-profit firms are contracted to provide such services and saved the Parks
Department $12.5 million in 2011 (Sankin, 2012). However, when it comes to
privatizing an ENTIRE public parks
system, such a bold step has yet to be made.
Before we explore why public parks privatization is lauded
as an effective cost-savings measure—as well as the reasons some vehemently oppose
it—let’s take a look at the history of our country’s public parks system.
According to Beckwith (1981), “governmental ownership of parkland is a
relatively recent phenomenon.” In the early- to mid-nineteenth century, the
government was poised to sell as much of its public lands as possible. However,
“…a new sense of scarcity arose because of the perceived depletion of natural
resources” and subsequently, the National Park Service was established in 1916
(Beckwith, 1981). The public parks movement was also spurred by the ideal of
egalitarianism, as supporters of conservation “demanded that the remaining public
lands be withdrawn from the market and reserved for conservation” (Beckwith,
1981).
Today, the National Park Service maintains 84,000,000 acres
of land and 397 national parks (“About Us,” 2012). These figures do not include
the numerous public parks operated at the state and municipal levels. However,
decades of conservation efforts are at risk of being jeopardized due to
ever-increasing budget cuts. As stated earlier, public parks privatization has
been cited as a potential solution to these budget shortfalls. The key reason
is the proven cost-effectiveness of privately run parks over publicly run
parks.
The privatization of public parks accomplishes cost savings
in a few ways. First, there are staffing savings. Private firms can pay employees
less than government agencies, including a decrease in employee benefits.
Beckwith (1981) even proposes increasing the number of volunteers working at
privatized parks as a way to cut costs, which he calls the independent sector.
He defends this recommendation by stating: “There is no presumption that those
who work in publicly owned parks must be public employees. Accordingly, the
most tentative step in the privatization of public parks would be to increase
the recruitment of volunteers to help manage the parks, particularly in the
more accessible municipal parks. This practice is already widespread.”
In general, when services are contracted out to more bottom-line
oriented, private firms, cost savings often result. As Beckwith (1981) puts it,
“Unlike a governmental bureaucracy, which has little incentive to hold down
costs, competitive private firms are driven to minimize costs in order to
survive and prosper in the marketplace. Public parks can only benefit from this
wider range of potential suppliers and their impetus toward efficiency."
However, even with these alleged cost savings, public parks
privatization also has several pitfalls. First, essentially selling out a
public park to a profit-oriented firm could mean abandoning the mission of a
public park. Based on the reasons for their initial creation, public parks are
not supposed to be profit-makers, but rather a conservation effort that can
also provide recreational enjoyment. As California State Senator Noreen Evans
(D) told The Huffington Post, “Once you privatize a park, you change the
essential mission of the park -- it becomes about making a profit. My own
philosophy is that a state park should be owned and operated by the public. Any
time you turn even a portion of a state park away from public control, you
always have the problem that the park's interest becomes inconsistent with
serving the public.”
In addition to abandoning the egalitarian mission of public
parks, privatization also cuts costs in ways that could be viewed as unethical.
The meager salaries and benefits that may be offered by private firms produce
cost savings to the detriment of staff, who may no longer receive livable
wages. These ethical concerns should not be forgotten in our quest to save the
public parks system.
References
