Parks: A Comparative Analysis
See Backgrounder: Facts and References
The apparent discrepancy between what was promised and what was delivered in regards to park rangers led us to compare the funding and staffing level for the BC Park system to other neighbouring jurisdictions.
You can see from the chart that far from having a "world-class" park system we are in fact languishing in last place in nearly all of the categories. It is important to note that the Alaska state park system receives the lowest funding out of all of the state park systems in the United States with the exception of North Dakota.
Although we didn't do an FOI specifically on conservation officers, in one of the FOI documents recently received by the Wilderness Committee it shows that BC currently has 127 FTE Conservation Officer (CO) positions for 2006/07 when according to Hansard there were approximately 160 CO's in BC in 2001.
According to the Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks Annual Report in 1996/97, with 8,266,000 hectares protected there was 1 staff person for every 23,219 hectares. In 2007 with 50% fewer staff and millions more hectares protected there is one staff person for every 72,625 hectares.
When you look at park rangers in 1997/98 (98.05 FTE ranger positions – Hansard 1997) there was 1 ranger for every 84,000 hectares of protected areas (8,266,000 hectares). In 2007 there is now just 1 park ranger for every 203,000 hectares during the summer months and just 1 permanent ranger for every 1.3 million hectares for the rest of the year.
To put things in perspective regarding the BC Parks operational budget: the fund (still growing) for the regeneration of Stanley Park is currently at $9 million. In comparison the total operational budget for the 852 parks and protected areas (13,000,000 hectares) in BC is $28 million. In British Columbia when the park system was substantially smaller than it is today the operational budget for BC parks was almost 20% higher than it is today. If you take into account inflation the current operational budget for BC Parks is even smaller.
Although the provincial government acts as if parks are an endless drain on the public purse, see the report they commissioned in 2001 shows the opposite. In fact for every dollar invested into parks by our provincial government, almost $10 is generated in park visitor expenditures.
Our park system in British Columbia took almost 100 years to build. It is an ecological legacy held in trust for all British Columbians. Not only do our parks protect some of the finest wildlife and wilderness areas in the province they also generate tremendous economic benefits to local communities. However, if we are to maintain our park system for future generations we must increase the operational budget of BC Parks and ensure that we have proper staffing levels to properly protect and manage our parks system.
