Five employees, or 20% of the staff, of Nevada's Great Basin National Park, were let go this past weekend, according to an employee of the park.
Posting in a personal capacity on LinkedIn on Saturday, Travis Mason-Bushman, the park's chief of interpretation, said three of the fired employees were in his division. The firings were first reported by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Great Basin National Park is known for Lehman Caves, a popular site in the park on the remote eastern edge of the state. Tours of the caves were canceled this week; those booked for Feb. 22 will get refunds, according to the park website. The page for tour information appeared blank on Wednesday.
Great Basin National Park was established in 1986, protecting Wheeler Peak's ancient bristlecone pines, the caves — which were originally protected as a national monument in 1922 — and some of the darkest skies in the U.S.
"These are people who lead tours, clean toilets, answer phones, design signs, and support search and rescue operations," Mason-Bushman wrote. "There is an obvious and immediate impact on visitor services. You cannot lay off half of any organization's frontline staff and carry on as if nothing has happened. There will be more impacts down the road. It takes people to serve people. That is simple reality."
Observers estimate that over the holiday weekend, 3,400 people were fired from the U.S. Forest Service, and 2,300 were fired from the Department of the Interior, which includes the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
It wasn't immediately clear if Nevadans in other Interior agencies had been fired.
