{"id":119666,"date":"2023-09-29T01:20:04","date_gmt":"2023-09-29T01:20:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uklevitrasupport.com\/?p=119666"},"modified":"2023-09-29T01:20:04","modified_gmt":"2023-09-29T01:20:04","slug":"gov-jared-polis-orders-plan-to-keep-national-parks-open-in-shutdown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uklevitrasupport.com\/politics\/gov-jared-polis-orders-plan-to-keep-national-parks-open-in-shutdown\/","title":{"rendered":"Gov. Jared Polis orders plan to keep national parks open in shutdown"},"content":{"rendered":"

Colorado Gov. Jared Polis issued an executive order Thursday directing state officials to prepare a plan to keep the state’s four national parks open through a potential government shutdown, days before their potential closure.<\/p>\n

With Republican infighting so far thwarting any congressional budget deal, the federally managed parks in Colorado — Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, the Great Sand Dunes, Mesa Verde and Rocky Mountain National Park — will close just after midnight on Sunday, Polis wrote. That could happen on a particularly busy weekend for Rocky Mountain during leaf-peeping season.<\/p>\n

Polis’ order directs the state’s Department of Natural Resources and Colorado Parks and Wildlife to develop a plan and identify potential funding needs to keep the parks open through a federal shutdown.<\/p>\n

State officials here and elsewhere have worked to keep parks open through shutdowns before. In 2013, the National Park Service reached a deal with Colorado officials to reopen Rocky Mountain National Park. The state agreed to donate $362,7000 to the park service, which had furloughed its workforce, to staff the park, though it later sought reimbursement.<\/p>\n

More than 5.5 million people visited Colorado’s national parks last year, according to the governor’s office, spending nearly $700 million in the process. The summer and fall are the busy season for Rocky Mountain National Park, according to the park service’s website.<\/p>\n

“The closure of the national parks and other federal lands would hurt state and local economies, small businesses and park employees,” Polis said in a news release accompanying his order.<\/p>\n

The governor’s office said Polis’ counterparts in Arizona and Utah had taken similar steps to ensure parks in those states remained open to the public.<\/p>\n

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