NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
                           MORNING REPORT


To:         All National Park Service Areas and Offices

From:       Division of Ranger Activities, Washington Office

Day/Date:   Friday, September 15, 2000

ALMANAC

On this date in 1857, William Howard Taft, the only man ever to serve 
as both president and chief justice of the United States, was born in 
Cincinnati, Ohio.  William Howard Taft National Historic Site contains 
his birthplace and boyhood home.

INCIDENTS

99-57/99-401 - Yosemite NP (CA) - Follow-up on Homicides

On September 13th, C.S. pled guilty to the murder of J.A. 
in federal district court in Fresno, California. J.A. 
was an instructor for the Yosemite Institute, an environmental 
education organization that operates in the park. Her body was found 
in a creek near her residence in Foresta on July 22, 1999. Formal 
sentencing is scheduled for November 30th. C.S. is also facing 
state charges for the February 1999 murders of C. and J.S. 
and S.P. in Mariposa County. Mariposa County is expected to 
begin prosecuting C.S. soon after his sentencing on federal 
charges. These cases have received extensive media coverage for more 
than a year and a half. [Dan Horner, SA, YOSE, 9/14]

00-582 - Acadia NP (ME) - Serious Employee Injury

Park employee J.W. was seriously injured in an accident on 
the morning of September 5th on Route 1A in Hancock County. The 
vehicle she was in drifted across the center line and into oncoming 
traffic, striking a van head-on. She was extricated from the vehicle, 
then flown by LifeFlight helicopter to Eastern Maine Medical Center. 
The occupants of the van were treated locally and released. J.W. 
underwent surgery to repair multiple fractures and is currently 
recovering at the center. Cards and letters can be sent to her at the 
following address: J.W., Room 391, Eastern Maine Medical 
Center, 489 State Street, Bangor, ME 04401. [Mike Healy, AO, ACAD, 9/15]

00-583 - Yellowstone NP (WY) - Search in Progress

An intensive search is currently underway for a 22-year-old man who 
has been missing since yesterday afternoon.  Z.B. and his parents, 
all from Wallingford, Connecticut, were touring the Canyon area when 
his parents decided to take a short hike near Artist Point.   Z.B. did 
not want to accompany the family and strongly insisted on remaining 
behind.  Z.B.'s parents left him near Artist Point while they took a 
short, half-hour hike.  When they returned, Z.B. was no longer there. 
The parents did an initial search of the area before requesting ranger 
assistance around 3 p.m.  Park staff immediately organized an air and 
ground search.  An area with a radius of nine miles was searched 
yesterday, but no sign of Z.B. was found. The search continued through 
the night, with temperatures dropping into the mid-20s. It's possible 
that he left the area, since he was upset with his parents. [Public 
Affairs, YELL, 9/15]

00-584 - Blue Ridge Parkway (NC/VA) - Poaching Arrest, Conviction

Two county deputies were passing an intersection of the parkway and 
Highway 21 in the early morning hours of September 3rd and saw a 
vehicle stopped on the parkway with its lights on. As they turned onto 
the parkway, it began to move away. They made a traffic stop and saw a 
12 gauge shotgun and a .22 rifle in plain view. Highlands District DR 
Brent Pennington was contacted and responded. A search of the vehicle 
led to the discovery of a spotlight and numerous large plastic bags. 
The four occupants - M.R.-V., H.R., A.A.-Z.,
and E.M. - were arrested and brought before a 
magistrate on September 5th. All were found guilty of CFR weapons and 
hunting violations. They were sentenced to three days in jail, banned 
from federal lands for two years, forfeited the firearms, and fined 
$200 each. [John Garrison, Protection Specialist, BLRI, 9/14]

00-585 - Blue Ridge Parkway (NC/VA) - Poaching Arrest, Conviction

On September 12th, ranger Marcia Bowers came upon an unoccupied van 
parked along the road with a cloth hanging from the window. She 
returned to the area later in the day and saw the van heading toward 
the exit for Highway 276. The driver ran a stop sign, so Bowers 
stopped it. She found 10,650 galax plants while searching the vehicle. 
Many had been pulled out with their root systems attached and had 
high-quality color and leaves. The occupants of the van were all from 
the same family; several were juveniles. The driver, J.S., 
was charged with CFR violations. The value of the galax has been 
placed at $2,650. [John Garrison, Protection Specialist, BLRI, 9/14]

                  [Additional reports pending....]

FIRE SITUATION

NATIONAL PREPAREDNESS LEVEL - Level III

The preparedness level has gone down one step.  

CURRENT SITUATION

Three new large fires were reported, four were contained. Initial 
attack was moderate throughout the United States. The majority of the 
western states will experience high temperatures and dry conditions 
over the next few days. 

Very high to extreme fire indices were reported in Oregon, California, 
Idaho, Utah, Nevada, Montana, Wyoming, Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, 
Arkansas and Oklahoma.

All federal employees of the National Park Service, Bureau of Indian 
Affairs, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service, and 
Forest Service are encouraged to complete a questionnaire about the 
1995 Federal Wildland Fire Management and Policy Review. It has been 
five years since the Departments of Agriculture and Interior adopted 
the policy. Secretaries Glickman and Babbitt are asking for help in 
revisiting this policy in order to ensure that it will continue to 
meet our needs. Please take about 10 minutes to complete the 
questionnaire by visiting the NIFC web site at 
www.nifc.gov/policy_survey. Responses are due by October 15th.

The following resources were committed nationwide as of yesterday 
(changes from yesterday's numbers in parentheses): 102 crews (+ 4), 
1,248 overhead (+ 13), 251 engines (+ 34), and 63 helicopters (- 8).

NPS AND NPS-RELATED FIRES

No reports.

OUTLOOK

NICC has issued two FIRE WEATHER WATCHES - the first for brisk 
northeast winds and low humidity in portions of northern Texas, the 
second for gusty north winds and low humidity in much of Alabama.

[NICC Incident Management Situation Report, 9/14]

DISCOVERY 2000

The theme of the Discovery 2000 conference yesterday was leadership. 
The keynote speaker was Dr. Peter Senge, a senior lecturer at MIT, 
chair of the Society for Organizational Learning, and author of the 
widely acclaimed book, "The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of 
the Learning Organization." 

Senge told listeners that the National Park Service has the 
opportunity to put more meaning in people's lives at a time when "more 
and more people are sensing that something is deeply out of whack" 
with the world. 

"People today are desperate for some quiet time," he said. "We are 
racing faster and faster to get where no one wants to go. Parks are a 
way to reconnect people to what is primary. Humans do not want to live 
separately from nature."

Senge went on to talk about leadership, asking members of the audience 
to state their own ideas about the elements of leadership. He then 
offered some insights into leadership, the work place, and how they 
interrelate. 

He said that leadership has nothing to do with position. Although it 
has bearing on management, a manager is not necessarily a leader. A 
manager is a person accountable for results produced by others. 
Leaders are people who create a climate that makes change possible and 
are invariably surrounded by people who've been able to make positive 
changes.

"Leadership is the capacity of the human community to shape its 
future," Senge said. "It is both deeply personal and inherently 
collective." 

Senge said that most workers spend at least some part of their careers 
feeling that they're victims, that someone else has created a 
situation that makes them less effective. Leaders cancel that 
perception and make it possible for people "to escape the prison of 
fatalism."

Early learning is self-motivated, he said, but school changes that. 
Young children learn three lessons right off when they start school - 
that teachers tell you what to learn, that teachers tell you when 
you've successfully learned, and that mistakes are not good. These 
lead directly to adult work values - someone else is supposed to tell 
you what to do, someone else evaluates you, and, above all, don't 
screw up. These perceptions have major impacts on organizations. 
Leaders have to get below that conditioning, he said.

Senge said that the machine has become the "guiding metaphor" for our 
industrial age, that there's no "meaning" or "story" for our time as 
there was in the past. "The fundamental problem of our time is that 
we're between stories," he said. 

Since the machine is inanimate, Senge said, we tend to see the world 
and all that is in it as inanimate. "The age we live in is an age of 
dead things," he said, but added that this perception is rapidly 
changing. "The age we are moving into is going to be an age of living 
things."

As before, the day was filled with workshops on a wide array of 
topics. The closing plenary session featured James Lee Witt, director 
of FEMA, who has been recognized for the dramatic and positive 
turnaround in the effectiveness of that agency over the past few 
years. He provided his eight rules for managing an organization:

o       Never lose focus on your customer.
o       State your mission.
o       Structure your organization around your mission statement.
o       Work with your career employees
o       Inform people of what's going on, as the most important tool 
        for anyone in any job is information.
o       Communicate your message.
o       Secure support from your constituents.
o       Build partnerships.

He said that failure is certain if you tell people what to do rather 
than getting them to buy into change by repeatedly and clearly 
explaining what needs to be done and why.

The conference closes this morning with some concluding comments and a 
address by Director Stanton entitled "The National Park Service of 
Tomorrow: Vision, Challenge and Exhortation."

Copies of the Discovery 2000 video and other materials will be made 
available in coming months. Current information on the conference can 
be found on the web at www.nps.gov/discovery2000. To see the daily 
conference newspaper, click on "Daily Newspaper;" for photos, the text 
of keynote addresses, a list of workshops, and reports on other 
events, click on the daily "highlights' listings.

                            *  *  *  *  *

Distribution of the Morning Report is through a mailing list managed 
by park, office and/or regional cc:Mail hub coordinators.  Please 
address requests pertaining to receipt of the Morning Report to your 
servicing hub coordinator.  The Morning Report is also available on 
the web at http://www.nps.gov/morningreport

Prepared by the Division of Ranger Activities, WASO, with the 
cooperation and support of Delaware Water Gap NRA.

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