The Biden administration is calling for a nearly $500 million increase in funding for the National Park Service for FY23/NPS file

If Congress were to adopt President Biden's Fiscal Year 2023 budget proposal, the National Park Service would see a nearly $500 million bump to $3.6 billion in its funding.

The administration's budget proposal, released Monday afternoon, calls for investments in some underfunded units of the National Park System, spending on climate science and landscape resiliency, and improvements on bandwidth available in the parks. It proposes an overall increase of $492.2 million.

“The 2023 budget demonstrates a commitment from the Biden-Harris Administration to address critical issues of our time,” said National Park Service Director Chuck Sams in a prepared statement. “The National Park Service plays an important role in connecting Americans to our interwoven history, culture, and environment. This funding is essential to help us continue to improve vital infrastructure, increase equity and inclusion, and tackle the climate crisis.”

Sams was traveling and not immediately available to field questions.

The proposal was applauded by The Everglades Foundation, which noted a $407 million line item for continuing the more than two-decade-long effort to restore the Everglades.

“The Everglades is a vital ecosystem that supports Florida’s economy, which is dependent on tourism, real estate and recreation," said Eric Eikenberg, the Foundation's CEO. "The Everglades provides the drinking water for nine million people and countless tourists while also providing climate resilience through many facets including its carbon sequestration capacity. Restoring the Everglades is a bipartisan priority at both the state and federal levels. The Everglades Foundation is excited by the steadfast support and recent momentum for Everglades restoration investment. We thank President Biden and the bipartisan Florida Congressional Delegation for their support for robust funding and look forward to continuing the progress in advancing the restoration of America’s Everglades.”

At the National Parks Conservation Association, CEO and President Theresa Pierno said the budget, if approved by Congress, would allow the Park Service to hire as many as 1,500 more staff.

“Amid the ongoing global pandemic, our national parks continue to break visitation records but funding for them has not kept pace. This budget would reinvest in our parks and would start to bring them out of the financial hole they’ve been trying to dig out of for over a decade," she said.

“On top of staffing woes, climate change is affecting parks from every angle and bringing many to a breaking point. Increased temperatures are drying out parks’ rivers and lakes, taking away critical water sources for plants and animals, destroying irreplaceable cultural sites and putting pressure on already failing infrastructure," she added. "We know that while our parks are hit hard by climate, they can also be part of the solution, but resources and staff are necessary to make real change."

Congress does not typically embrace a president's budgetary blueprint. For FY22, Biden called for $3.5 billion for the Park Service, and Congress settled on $3.26 billion, according to NPCA figures.

Areas the Biden administration highlighted in its FY23 Park Service proposal include:

Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility Initiative 

The budget proposes targeted increases of $48 million servicewide to advance racial justice and equity for underserved communities. Many of the newest additions to the National Park System preserve the stories of under-represented communities, and the FY 2023 budget requests new funds to support their operations, including Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument, Camp Nelson National Monument, and Pullman National Monument. Programs such as the African American Civil Rights Network, Underground Railroad Network to Freedom, and Tribal Heritage grants reflect this commitment.

The additional $48 million requested in the budget includes: 

• $14.3 million for operational increases at parks that preserve the stories of under-represented communities, including many of the newest parks 
• $5.0 million to support African American Civil Rights Network partnerships  
• $5.7 million to increase capacity at parks and central offices to strengthen partnerships and improve coordination with Tribes. 
• $8.0 million for grants to Tribal Historic Preservation Offices. 
• $5.0 million to improve park accessibility by implementing an interdisciplinary network support model, including facility access,  accessible programming, recreational experiences and technology 
• $5.0 million to address transportation barriers to parks from underserved communities 
• $5.0 million for large-scale competitive African American Civil Rights historic preservation grants 

Conservation Initiative

Stewardship of natural and cultural resources is a mission critical task for the National Park Service. With targeted increases of $227.6 million, the budget seeks to bolster existing successful programs that protect wildlife and landscape, fund climate change science and resiliency, and increase resources supporting science-based climate and natural resource decision making. An important component to tackling the climate crisis is the Biden-Harris Administration’s goal to conserve 30% of the nation’s lands and waters by 2030.

In total, the budget requests an increase of $227.6 million to support climate-related needs, including: 

• $57.0 million to increase park natural resources operational capacity 
• $29.6 million to complete natural resource projects, such as wildlife migration corridors, wildland fire fuels management, and responding to natural resource threats.
• $31.0 million to establish a Civilian Climate Corps. 
• $17.0 million for Research Learning Centers that facilitate the use of parks for scientific research, share knowledge, and support informed decision making.  
• $16.0 million for the Inventory and Monitoring Program that tracks key park resources. 
• $10.0 million increase for abandoned mineral lands projects. 
• $5.5 million for Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Units which bring together scientists, managers, students, and others to conduct interdisciplinary projects.  
• $3.7 million to create an interdisciplinary team to design and conduct inventory and monitoring of cultural resources impacted by climate change. 
• $3.5 million for the Socioeconomic Monitoring program to improve understanding of the demographics and behaviors of visitors

Addressing Infrastructure and Construction Needs 

Significant investment is needed in national park  infrastructure to provide safe and quality experiences for hundreds of millions of visitors each year. Multiple funding sources are part of a concerted effort to address the extensive maintenance repair backlog in national parks. The existing network of roads, trails, restrooms, campgrounds, water treatment systems, and visitor facilities are aging, and many exceed the capacity for which they were designed. A new facility condition assessment methodology will provide a more streamlined, comprehensive, consistent, and timely identification of repair needs estimates.

The budget proposal calls for:  

• $959 million for Facility Operations and Maintenance, including $136 million for repair and rehabilitation projects and $188.2 million for cyclic maintenance projects. 
• $6.9 million to address increase leased and owned housing supply for NPS employees. 
• $279.3 million to fund construction projects, equipment replacement, management, planning, and special projects. This includes $120.7 million for line-item construction. 
• $6.9 million to make incremental improvements to NPS bandwidth and network capacity, including last-mile connections and other infrastructure improvements. 

Operations 

The request continues the commitment to the daily mission of providing enriching experiences for the public in every national park. There are multiple requests across initiatives and functional areas to build or restore operational capacity. The budget request increases which will support more than 1,400 additional full time equivalent employees to strengthen critical functions at parks, including dedicated increases for telling under-represented stories at some of the newest parks, increasing natural resources management capacity to ensure parks are prepared to manage through climate change, restoring law enforcement capacity to the U.S. Park Police, and a general capacity increase of $30.8 million that would benefit all parks.