Undermining the Park Service

The appointment of William Penn Mott as the director of the National Park Service in 1985 seemed to signal a real shift away from the anti-environmental mind-set brought to the Interior Department by Secretary James G. Watt early in the Reagan Administration. Mott, a respected Californian, is a dedicated environmentalist who properly saw that a stagnant, retrenched park program was not in the national interest.

Alas, the apparent change in mood at the Interior Department was ephemeral. Mott is still the director and still proposing all the right programs. But he is not being allowed to run the Park Service the way it should be run. Almost from the day he took office, Mott has been undercut and overruled by higher-ups.

In the most recent case William Horn, the assistant secretary for wildlife and parks, is reported to have ordered a major personnel reorganization without Mott’s knowledge or approval. One proposed change seemed designed to force the early retirement of Howard Chapman of San Francisco, a popular 40-year Park Service veteran, as the Western regional director. In an annual awards program, Mott gave Chapman the top rating, but his “1” evaluation was changed to a “4.” That, one parks insider said, was tantamount to showing Chapman the door.

Horn denies that Mott’s authority has been eroded, claiming that many of his proposals have not been implemented because of budget restraints. Chapman, however, voices the prevailing sentiment within the service that Interior’s political appointees are “dismembering the professional capability of the National Park Service.”

The reports must not be ignored. If Mott is to be the director, he should be allowed to direct. If not, the President or Congress should find out why.