- Subject: NPS Morning Report - Friday, September 23, 1994
- Date: Fri, 23 Sep 1994
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
MORNING REPORT
To: All National Park Service Areas and Offices
From: Division of Ranger Activities, Washington Office
Day/Date: Friday, September 23, 1994
Broadcast: By 1000 ET
INCIDENTS
94-53 - Channel Islands (California) - Follow-up on Boat Sinking
An unexpected winter storm which struck the California coast last February
with winds in excess of 50 knots led to the wrecking of the commercial
fishing trawler, "Susie", owned by J.M. of Santa Barbara, in Cuyler
Harbor on San Miguel Island. The vessel's hull was severely damaged, and
about 150 gallons of fuel spilled into harbor waters. An investigation of
the incident led rangers to arrest J.M. on charges of abandoning property
and polluting park waters. That case is still pending before the court.
Meanwhile, park staff, with the technical and financial assistance of WASO's
Office of Environmental Quality, seized the vessel, secured the remaining
petroleum products on board the boat to keep them from leaking, and removed
all debris from the boat. This week, park maintenance workers, boat
operators and rangers successfully removed the "Susie" from the park without
incident. The 14-person salvage team had to employ a front-end loader and
three vessels, including an 80-foot landing craft, to remove the boat. If
the government is successful in its prosecution of J.M., reimbursement
will be sought for costs associated with the boat's removal. [Jack
Fitzgerald, CHIS, 9/22]
94-564 - Yellowstone (Wyoming) - Visitor Injured by Bear
K.V.M., 40, of Corona Del Mar, California, was hiking alone on
the Fairy Falls trail when he heard a noise off the trail, turned, and saw a
bear, probably a sub-adult grizzly, charging toward him from a distance of
40 to 50 feet. K.V.M. ran about 15 to 20 feet and hid behind a tree,
but the bear came around the side of the tree, knocked him down, and
attacked him. K.V.M. suffered four minor puncture wounds and a minor
laceration to his left hand, a minor puncture wound to the back of his head,
and a minor abrasion to his back. When he fell to the ground, the bear ran
off. K.V.M. was able to hike out to the trailhead on his own, where
he was met by rangers responding to the incident, which had been reported by
other hikers. K.V.M. received basic first aid treatment from the
rangers, who cleansed and bandaged the wounds, before leaving the area.
This is the fourth grizzly-bear-related human injury in the park this year.
[Mike Murray, ACR, YELL, 9/22]
94-565 - Hawaii Volcanoes (Hawaii) - Recovery of Stolen Property
On September 22nd, rangers and investigators executed a search warrant at
the residence of John Davis, 28, and seized an $1800 painting and several
other items which had been taken from the Volcano House, a park concession,
over the past year. Information recently obtained indicated that Davis, a
recently fired Volcano House employee, had the items at his home. Also
seized was a small quantity of drugs. Davis was arrested for outstanding
federal warrants that originated from the park, and was also charged with
possession of marijuana and cocaine. Theft and possession charges are
pending further investigation and indictment. [Scott Hinson, CI, PAAR,
9/22]
FIRE ACTIVITY
1) PREPAREDNESS LEVEL - III
2) LARGE FIRE SUMMARY
Wed Fri % Est
State Area Fire IMT 9/21 9/23 Cont Cont
ID Boise NF Thunderbolt T2 21,000 21,000 75 10/1
Payette NF Corral Creek -
Blackwell Cx T1 149,995 150,630 67 10/12
Chicken Cx T1 93,770 93,770 54 NEC
CA Lassen NF Barkley T2 6,000 32,000 20 NEC
Shasta -
Trinity NF Coffee Cx T2 900 985 95 9/23
Six Rivers NF * Mad -- - 100 0 NEC
Klamath NF * Specimen T2 - 4,000 0 NEC
HEADING NOTES:
Fire Asterisk indicates newly reported fire (on this report). Cx =
complex.
IMT T1 = Type 1; T2 = Type II; ST = State Team.
% Con Percent of fire contained.
Est Con Estimated containment date. NEC = no estimated date of
containment; CND = fully contained; NR = no report.
3) FIRES -
NPS BIA BLM FWS States USFS Total
Number 3 1 2 0 85 12 103
Acres Burned 1 1 0 0 770 15,167 15,939
4) COMMITTED RESOURCES -
Crews Engines Helicopters Airtankers Overhead
Federal 150 148 67 18 1,150
Non-federal 135 206 29 4 1,060
5) COMPARATIVE SUMMARY -
CY 1994 Five Year Average
Year-to-Date Year-to-Date
Number of Fires 60,925 58,744
Acres Burned 3,615,160 2,349,373
6) OVERALL SITUATION - Initial attack operations continued at a moderate
level yesterday. Large fires in California continued to burn actively, and
there was a slight increase in activity on Idaho fires. Demobilization
remains moderate but steady throughout the system.
7) OUTLOOK - A red flag warning has been posted for low humidities and
strong east winds in northwestern Oregon. Fair weather will dominate the
remainder of the West. Large fires will continue to burn due to warm and
dry conditions.
[NIFCC Incident Management Situation Report, 9/23]
RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
No field reports today.
OPERATIONAL NOTES
1) 6(c) Updates - It will again be necessary for CSRS employees who filed
timely requests for individual service credit under 8336(c) (and yearly
updates) to file a new update by September 30, 1994, to cover an additional
year. It will also be necessary for any other CSRS employees who wish to
have the Department consider coverage for their present position to file
within one year of the date they entered that position. Employees who have
been assigned to 6(c) covered positions, including employees recently
reassigned to the covered protection benchmark positions, do not have to
file yearly updates as long as they remain in those covered positions. A
full set of instructions on filing claims will appear in CLEAR TEXT, the
Ranger Activities Division cc:Mail newsletter, early next week.
MEMORANDA
"Streamlining/Washington Office Reorganization", signed by Deputy Director
Reynolds and sent to all employees on September 22nd. Because of the
breadth and consequence of issues discussed in the memorandum, the full text
is being included in this Morning Report:
"As you undoubtedly know, Secretary Babbitt and Assistant Secretary Frampton
have approved our proposed reorganization plan, with some modifications and
additional elaboration and discussion of some aspects of the proposal.
"This approval does not mean that we are free to go ahead and reorganize.
Congress must approve all reorganizations. This is accomplished by the
National Park Service submitting a 'reprogramming letter' through the
Department of Interior and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to the
House and Senate Appropriations Committees. Now that the plan has been
approved in the Department, we can proceed to write and submit the letter,
which we intend to do within the next few weeks. We do not know how long it
will take the letter to move through the Department, OMB, or Congress. It
is likely that it will take no less than two or three months.
"In the meantime, it is our responsibility to continue to manage the
National Park Service under the current organization, improve our processes
for achieving work, and plan for implementation of the plan. Director
Kennedy and the rest of the Directorate, including myself, realize how
difficult this is to employees, especially those of you in central offices.
"Operation Future is working hard to produce a final copy of the plan so
that we can print it and distribute it throughout the Service. I expect it
will take two to four weeks before that task is completed. There are only a
few major changes to the plan, and they are listed below in Assistant
Secretary Frampton's memorandum. However, there are a number of minor
additions and clarifications which will require a significant amount of
redrafting.
"I will continue to keep you informed as events unfold. With that as
introduction, following is the full text of Assistant Secretary Frampton's
memo to Director Kennedy, dated September 21, 1994:
'We have agreed that the following changes or elaborations will be
incorporated into the Restructuring Plan as it was presented to and approved
by the Secretary:
1. The positions of Associate Director, Natural Resource Management, and
Associate Director, Cultural Resources and Partnerships, will be
retained as separate positions. Both positions will be advertised as
SES positions; we should have these proposals to go forward to the
Executive Resources Board within the next day or two.
2. To assist the new Associate Director for Natural Resource Management,
we will convene an ad hoc work group of 8-10 people to update the 1992
Strategic Plan for Natural Resources Management and review the role of
NPS natural science in the post-NBS era, and develop a work plan for
closer collaboration with NBS. We should select this group within the
next week, give them a deadline of no more than 60 days from now, and
anticipate that they will need to meet together several times in order
to finalize their recommended strategy.
3. The Natural Resource Management function will have a visible presence
as a separate program with the equivalent of an Assistant Field
Director in each field director's office and a division chief or
associate superintendent in each System Support Office, with details
to be recommended by the ad hoc work group referenced in paragraph 2.
We need to consider similar treatment for cultural resources, and
whether in some System Support Offices natural and cultural resource
management programs should be combined.
4. Virtually all partnership programs will be placed under the Associate
Director, Cultural Resources and Partnerships, including the National
Recreation Programs and Recreation Grants Division. It will be the job
of the Associate Director and an Assistant Director for Partnerships
not only to administer existing partnership programs but to develop
strategies for the Service to develop new partnership skills at all
levels.
5. The reporting responsibilities of the Offices of Public Affairs,
Legislation and Congressional Affairs, International Affairs, etc.,
need to be clarified, since they would not ordinarily report to a
Chief of Staff but rather to a line function such as a Director of
External Affairs, Deputy Director, or Special Assistant to the
Director. A decision also needs to be made about responsibility for
the Office of Policy to include such functions as Boards and
Commissions.
6. Concessions management will not be decentralized, as implied in the
Task Force proposal, but will be sufficiently centralized to meet the
needs we have identified, at least until expertise in business
planning is consolidated into NPS and procedures and operating
regulations are developed under the new Concessions Management Reform
Act, and sufficient experience gained under the new regime. A
detailed plan must be developed right away outlining the structure of
Concessions Management.
7. The Task Force proposal provided positions in the Field Directors'
offices for budget and finance. It also recommended that these
functions in the Washington Office be placed under the Associate
Director for Administration. In light of the need to solve leftover
financial accountability weaknesses, and in view of the importance of
the budget function, a final decision needs to be made about these
locations and the reporting line. I think such a decision should be
finalized no later than 30 days after a new Associate Director of
Administration comes on duty.
8. If we obtain reprogramming authority we will pick a date in early 1995
to convert to the new field structure, i.e., field director offices
and system support offices. However, system support offices will be
located in existing cities for the balance of Fiscal 1995; in other
words, we will not open offices in new locations until FY 1996.
Requests for new office locations need to be provided for in the FY 96
budget justification; that has not been done to date.
9. In light of the plan to downsize the Washington office and to
streamline congressional and legislative affairs, and because of the
confusion regarding the role of 'desk officers' for each Field
Director which the Task Force recommended be chosen by field directors
and located in the Office of Legislative Affairs, the desk officer
concept will be put on indefinite hold until the new management team
has an opportunity to review the concept. If we eventually decide to
go forward with this approach after Field Director offices are
established, the desk officers will not be located in Legislative
Affairs because of the Administration's emphasis on centralized
legislative prioritization.
10. The Incident Command Team has done a great job and accomplished the
tasks we assigned them. Implementation of the Restructuring Plan, as
revised, will now become the responsibility of the new senior
management team. However, a full-time implementation staff (including
a liaison from PMB) will have to be established. I understand John
Reynolds is working on forming the team this week.
11.XxxOne of the implementation staff's first jobs will be to identify
adjustments to the plan as a result of the Secretary's pledge that NPS
will be held as harmless as possible from FY 96 and FY 97 FTE cuts.
This could increase the number of positions to be allocated to parks
over the next few years by as much as 450 FTEs. Although the plan may
not be directly affected, since the same number of FTE reductions will
occur in central and field offices, some adjustments in implementation
may have to be made as a result of this welcome change.
'Since we have not communicated these changes in detail to the Regional
Directors and field, as promised in our teleconference with the Secretary
last week, I am asking Anne Badgley and John to distribute this memo to the
Directorate and Superintendents.'"
Prepared by the Division of Ranger Activities, WASO, with the cooperation
and support of Delaware Water Gap NRA.
Telephone: 202-208-4874
Telefax: 202-208-6756
cc:Mail: WASO Ranger Activities
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