A Warning from the Former Head of Channel Islands National Park

Robbing our national parks of funding and resources, as the Trump administration is proposing, will not just mean unclean bathrooms or long lines at Yosemite. “It is setting up the [National Parks] Service to fail,” said Russell Galipeau, former superintendent of Channel Islands National Park and member of the Executive Council of the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks.

In an interview with the Independent, Galipeau detailed the fears he has over the Trump administration’s proposed cuts to public lands in its 2026 budget request to Congress, including a proposal to take $1.2 billion out of the National Park Service’s pocket. Without providing a clear explanation, the administration stated in its budget request, “There is an urgent need to streamline staffing and transfer certain properties to State-level management to ensure the long-term health and sustainment of the National Park System.”

Galipeau ran Channel Islands National Park for 15 years before retiring in 2018. However, his career spanned 40 years, and included tenures at National Parks in Alaska, Kentucky, and Florida. His love for the natural world can be traced back to a ninth grade biology class with a teacher who loved the outdoors, and a childhood in Florida, where swamps practically grow behind Walmarts. That origin story progresses through some casual spelunking and learning the history of the National Parks after college, which sparked an appreciation for natural resources, and an urge to protect them for future generations.

He is all too familiar with what is at stake should the Channel Islands lose federal funding — the most immediate being any potential visitors’ summer plans.

For one, the islands’ campgrounds could be closed to visitation. Cell service is sparse out there, and staff need to be present on the islands to allow visitors. Imagine if the water stops working, or a camper gets hurt, Galipeau said. There would be no one to reach out to for help.

All the bathrooms on the islands are pit toilets, which means that if the park can’t afford contractors to empty them out, they have to shut them down. The Channel Islands do not have a sewage system. 

“That’s what happens when we do these budget cuts,” Galipeau said. “We’re not talking about bathrooms not being clean. We’re talking about them being unusable.” 

Galipeau became a hardened activist in the face of Trump’s attacks on National Parks — including severe staffing reductions, a hiring freeze, and now, this proposed White House budget with the largest cut ever to the National Park Service.

According to the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA), the White House’s proposed $900 million cut to the service’s operating budget could shutter at least 350 national park sites nationwide — effectively more than 75 percent of the national park system. That’s in addition to cuts to National Recreation and Preservation grants, cultural programs, and the complete elimination of funding for the Natural Heritage Areas Program. 

Funding for the agency “was already down about 20 percent from where it was 15 years ago,” Galipeau said. Between 2011 and 2023, he added, it lost 15 percent of its workforce. 

But at the same time, the parks are seeing record visitation. Last year, there were more than 330 million visits to the parks, attracting more visitors than all major sporting events and Disney amusement parks combined. In California, Yosemite, Sequoia, and Redwood national parks each added 200,000 to 350,000 new visitors last year.

Budget cuts would hurt visitor experiences, public safety, and effective wildfire and natural resource management, which are already being affected by a gutted workforce, according to the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks.

“The degradation of irreplaceable park resources — and the quality of the visitor experience — may result in frustration and disappointment surrounding our national parks,” Galipeau said. “It will jeopardize the protection of these spaces for the future.”

“In addition,” he continued, “without natural and cultural resources staff, we will have a hard time keeping up studies that help us understand and protect the iconic species that call our national parks home.”

When Galipeau says that the parks are being set up to fail, he thinks it’s for a sinister purpose: privatization, a fear expressed by many former and current leaders in the National Park Service. Budget cuts would essentially shoot the service in the foot. Then the administration can blame it for being unable to run properly, providing an excuse to turn the power over to those who see America’s natural spaces as unexploited money-makers. People like Galipeau fear corporations making the parks into entertainment destinations akin to Disneyland. 

“We have to remember that when Congress set up the national parks, they said, ‘Hey, your job is to conserve these natural and historic and wildlife resources in an unimpaired condition for the future enjoyment of our visitors,’” he said. “You turn that over to a private enterprise, you have to wonder, can that mandate be met?”

The worst-case scenario for Galipeau is the Channel Islands National Park becoming neglected: “It could wither away,” he said. “The park only gets about 300,000 visitors … so a poor park like Channel Islands, which has been significant to conservation around the world and still provides enjoyment to people, the resources could really deteriorate in the wrong hands or without the right people to look after it.”