Protecting Yellowstone National Park

The Administration asked the United Nations to remove Yellowstone from a list of parks in need of international attention, despite environmental problems that continute to threaten the park.

The Bush Administration has suppressed important information about continuing ecological problems at Yellowstone National Park in order to avoid international attention.

In April 2003, Deputy Assistant Interior Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks Paul Hoffman wrote to the United Nations’ World Heritage Committee and requested that Yellowstone be removed from a list of parks at risk and in need of international attention. He wrote, “Yellowstone is no longer in danger.” To make this argument, Mr. Hoffman cited a reported written by Yellowstone Park staff. However, this report had apparently been substantially edited to suppress scientific information.[1]

A draft report in early 2003 discussed several problems that continue to threaten Yellowstone, including the degradation of water from mining toxins, a parasitic disease among native trout, and continued controversy over potentially diseased bison who stray outside park boundaries.[2] The final version of the report sent by the Interior Department to the United Nation’s World Heritage Committee does not include these ongoing concerns.[3]

The deletions led Roger G. Kennedy, former Director of the National Park Service, to tell the Los Angeles Times:

Tinkering with scientific information, either striking it from reports or altering it, is becoming a pattern of behavior. . . . It represents the politicizing of a scientific process, which at once manifests a disdain for professional scientists working for our government and a willingness to be less than candid with the American people.[4]

Mr. Kennedy also wrote a letter to the World Heritage Committee urging it not to remove Yellowstone from the list and calling Interior’s letter a “deceptively bland assessment” of the park’s status.[5] After lengthy debate, the Committee removed Yellowstone from the list, but required the United States to report back on several ongoing environmental threats and requested that the government involve independent organizations and scientists in its assessments.[6]

[1] Administration, Yellowstone Staff at Odds on Park Threats, Los Angeles Times (June 26, 2003).

[2] Yellowstone Park Staff, Yellowstone National Park Site Report to the World Heritage Committee (2003) (online at http://greateryellowstone.org/YNP_site_report.html).

[3] Department of the Interior, Yellowstone National Park Site Report to the World Heritage Committee (Feb. 2003) (online at http://greateryellowstone.org/DOI_site_report.pdf).

[4] Administration, Yellowstone Staff at Odds on Park Threats, supra note 1.

[5] Letter from Roger G. Kennedy to Francesco Bandarin, Secretary of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee (June 25, 2003) (online at http://greateryellowstone.org/kennedy_letter.html).

[6] Park Will Be off List; World Panel Still Worried, Billings Gazette (July 2, 2003).