[Ski]

Not too much poking around leads you to the outfit that runs the Kalaloch Lodge, Delaware North LLC, the same company that runs facilities at Yellowstone, Yosemite, and who knows how many other NPS lodging facilities.

[joker]

Do they also run the campground? The folks dealing with the campground were dressed in park uniforms and driving park trucks, unlike the folks at the lodge...

[Schroder]

Here's who runs the reservation system now: Active Network LLC (ReserveAmerica) and the Wikipedia article on the company that operates the Campgrounds: Delaware North, owned by Jeremy Jacobs

[Cody s]

I am starting to feel old, I remember the days when you could go to a visitor center and ask a park ranger something and get an answer, The last couple years the only answer I've gotten is "I'm not sure about that, I'm not from around here, maybe you could ask at the zanterra gift shop" yes, it has happened in the grand canyon, Yosemite, glacier, and even Yellowstone to name a few.

[Malachai Constant]

Private corporations must make a profit or cease to exist did you really expect you would get more service for less money. If you did I have a bridge from Manhattan to Brooklyn you might be interested in. Zinke is will ahead of James Watt in the a$$holery department.

[cdestroyer]

if ya look back over the post herein the forum you should take notice of the number of people wanting to camp. So yall should have seen this coming for a long time. the U.S. govt is broke, does not have the resources to take care of the parks let alone the forests. To many areas stopped due to animal protections, wilderness protections, etc etc. Who maintains the campground table, toilets and hauls out the trash? It all costs money, so now yall is gonna pay to hike, camp, sightsee. shoulda seen it coming!!!!

[Schroder]

[Randito]

[Ski]

^ both Randy and Schroder raise valid points. No way a private contractor is going to perform the same service for any less money, especially in light of the fact that they're going to be a for profit operation. Government agencies have no Congressional mandate to make a profit, let alone break even. The problem is that the nation's priorities are all screwed up, and have been for the better part of a century; Dwight Eisenhower warned the country about it in his farewell address, but the powers that be chose not to listen, so instead of investing in our infrastructure and things like National Parks (which generate huge amounts of money into local economies) and education, we piss away our national treasure into the bottomless pit of defense contracts and subsidizing multinational corporate giants.

[cdestroyer]

randyhiker:"USFS typical campground "tent site" $16 / night". is this an established campground or one like rattlesnake in the methow that used to be free and now charges a fee? and how much is the fee? fees have gone up since I last camped in an established cg. I only paid $7 for a night.

[Malachai Constant]

There is wide variation on campground pricing. Mostly it depends on who got the contract to manage it same with National Parks. On our last trip to the SW we stayed in NF, NP, BLM, and State Parks in California, Utah, Colorado, Oregon, and New Mexico. State parks were the most expensive but were generally cleaner and had showers and hookups. BLM were cheapest free or $7. NP $20 except where Xanterra managed going to $30. Geezer pass works in federally owned ones. Very few federally managed ones except BLM. They get seniors to be campground host to do the dirty work in exchange for a place to stay all summer. In Oregon the concessionaire was charging thru hikers a daily parking fee but enough people complained and the changed the policy. Your results may vary.

[drm]

The NPS may not need to make a profit, but Federal employers are sometimes required or at least cajoled to pay a decent ("prevailing") wage and not squeeze employees as much as private employers can.

[Bernardo]

Yes, I think outsourcing is mostly about labor costs. Pensions are a big difference. Sad to hear all this even if I don't camp in campgrounds much.

[joker]

I suspect in this particular case the "privatizing" is mostly about throwing a few bones to a couple of well-placed companies and having another talking point in the "run government like a business" fairy tale. If it happens watch real hard to see if we'll ever be shown a fair comparison of the net effect on park budgets. As noted above by a few folks, a fair bit of campground related labor has already made to the "outsourced" stage - this proposal goes well beyond that...

[drm]

So is this about hiring concessionaires to run campgrounds or genuinely privatizing them? The former is pretty common but the latter implies actually selling them and I've never heard of that. Maybe the reporter was just being careless with wording as they do refer to concessionaires in the article.