An inspector general's flash report published Thursday raised concerns about the National Parks Service's plans to use Inflation Reduction Act funding for hiring before it expires. David Madison / Getty Images
National Park Service’s IRA hiring surge could fail ahead of funding deadline
While the legislation gave hundreds of millions to NPS for hiring, it didn’t grant new hiring flexibilities, which the Interior Department inspector general reports is hampering progress.
There’s a possibility that the National Park Service won’t be able to spend the $500 million it received as part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act to bolster hiring before the funding expires in fiscal 2030.
“Given the challenges NPS faces with hiring and filling a large number of positions, there is a potential risk that NPS may not fully execute its hiring plans on time before funds expire,” the Office of the Inspector General for the Interior Department wrote in a flash report published Thursday.
NPS is planning on using the IRA funding to hire 1,418 employees, including information technology specialists, maintenance workers and park rangers. Approximately half of the positions are term appointments, meaning the employment period is between one to four years.
However a NPS budget analyst told investigators that a lack of hiring flexibilities is slowing things down. The federal government sometimes uses such flexibilities to exempt certain processes and speed up recruitment. It’s one method federal agencies have used since 2023 to bring on hundreds of AI experts. But without those flexibilities, NPS said it can take several months to a year to onboard new employees.
NPS also has previously expressed that a shortage of housing for prospective employees hinders recruitment.
The OIG reported that, as of May 31, NPS has spent about $21 million of the money and has onboarded 447 employees.
"We appreciate the IG’s review and affirmation that NPS has established effective and accountable business systems to track these funds provided by the Inflation Reduction Act, and that while NPS faces challenges in recruitment we are hiring as fast as possible within existing authorities," an NPS spokesperson said in a statement.
While the number of visitors to national parks has increased, the number of full-time employees has decreased. Between fiscal 2011 and 2022, NPS reported that the total number of its workers went down by approximately 15%.
Of the $500 million provided to NPS in the IRA:
- $29 million is for a director’s priority fund to address emerging issues, such as staffing for new parks.
- $19 million is to hire U.S. Park Police officers in New York City, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.
- $11 million is to establish a Human Resources team to support IRA-enabled hiring.
- The remaining $441 million is allocated among the parks, with more money going to larger parks like Yellowstone in Wyoming and Grand Canyon in Arizona.