BELLINGHAM — After some speculation following the federal hiring freeze imposed by President Donald Trump, the National Park Service announced it will hire seasonal workers to staff its 63 parks this summer.
“The National Park Service is hiring seasonal workers to continue enhancing the visitor experience as we embrace new opportunities for optimization and innovation in workforce management,” an NPS spokesperson said in a statement given to McClatchy on Thursday morning. “We are focused on ensuring that every visitor has the chance to explore and connect with the incredible, iconic spaces of our national parks.”
The initial executive order implementing the hiring freeze contained an exception for “non-career employees or officials if approved by agency leadership appointed by the President,” leaving room for a potential workaround. The Associated Press reported late last week that the president had sent a memo giving NPS — which manages 370 additional sites across the country, including national monuments and national historic sites — permission to hire 7,700 seasonal employees, up from the usual number around 6,350.
“Seasonal hiring has resumed, and that’s good news, at least for the short term,” Bill Wade, executive director of the Association of National Park Rangers, told McClatchy in an email.
National parks resume seasonal hiring
Hiring seasonal employees is seen as essential to handling the surge of visitors that national parks get during peak months, typically the summer. According to NPS data, the national park system as a whole sees three to four times more visitors during summer months than it does during ones in the winter.
Washington’s national parks see an especially sharp increase in visitors each summer — the state’s three parks saw 929,630 combined visitors in 2023’s busiest month, August, and just 88,000 in January. Tim McNulty, vice president of Olympic Park Advocates, previously told McClatchy that seasonal workers make up over half of the visitor-facing staff at the park during the summer. McNulty warned that it would have been “disastrous” for Olympic had NPS decided not to hire seasonal workers.
“The bulk of services provided to park visitors are provided by seasonal employees,” McNulty said in late January. “They include visitor center information, road and campground maintenance, restrooms, ranger-led interpretive programs, safety patrols — roads and backcountry wilderness — emergency response, resource protection … the list goes on.”
Previously, it appeared as though NPS had put a pause on seasonal hiring. In late January, a spokesperson for the Department of the Interior, which oversees NPS, told McClatchy that “the Department of the Interior and the National Park Service are implementing President Donald J. Trump’s Executive Order across the federal civilian workforce.”
Wade told McClatchy in late January that he’d heard reports of prospective seasonal employees having offers rescinded as NPS mulled its response to the hiring freeze.
What it means for WA national parks
The new developments give parks a little over three months to bring seasonal staff on board before the start of June. Wade said the new timeline should give parks just enough time to hire seasonal employees, although the delay might mean parks are understaffed early in the busy season.
“The problem is that I think the hiring is all being done centrally, rather than park by park, and with all the paperwork that has to be done — background checks for some employees, training, housing logistics, etc. — we think there could be some delay into the busy season before all the seasonals can be on board,” Wade said.
Even if hiring can be completed on time, that doesn’t necessarily mean parks will be staffed at normal capacity. According to a document released by the office of Sen. Patty Murray, the Trump administration is believed to have laid off 1,000 national park employees. Murray’s office said that it remains to be seen if any of Washington’s parks are affected, but Wade recently told both the Washington State Standard and Axios that he’d heard of five or six layoffs at each Washington national park. In an email to McClatchy, Wade confirmed that he hasn’t heard of any additional firings since providing those numbers.
