Photo by: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
As the government shutdown continues, park administrators across the nation began closing more federal land to the public in a bid to protect the coveted sites. The impasse between President Trump and Congress over funding for a wall on the nation’s southern border has allowed for only a skeleton staff in each park. “Each day there is going to be increased consequences,” said Jon Jarvis, former National Park Service director under President Obama, who helped make the decision to completely close the parks during a 16-day government closure in 2013. “Managing a park like Yosemite is like managing a city,” said Jarvis, who now serves as executive director of UC Berkeley’s Institute for Parks, People, and Biodiversity. “The Park Service has all the responsibilities that a city has, and suddenly you have no services but the population is still there. That’s a huge problem.”
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