The tradition of having rangers and other state park personnel live on site has been on the chopping block, with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources officials recently announcing the eviction of such employees from their state-owned homes. Covering needed repairs to the structures would cost close to $1 million, and DNR officials decided evicting the employees would be better than fixing the homes.

That’s shortsighted.

Having a presence on location serves these treasured resources well. Without a ranger on site, law enforcement would have to respond to more calls at the parks, often from some distance away. In the event of a crime, an accident, a medical emergency or even a power outage, rangers on site are able to respond much more quickly than law enforcement in these remote areas.

About one-third of the state’s parks, preserves and forests have a housing facility for personnel. In those cases, it becomes a nice perk to attract employees in this tight labor market.

Park Ranger Jason Gilmore, who lives at Bellevue State Park and also works at Mines of Spain State Recreation Area, is one of the employees being told to move out. Both areas experienced marked increases in use during the pandemic that haven’t subsided.

Statewide, more than 16 million people and 818,000 campers visited Iowa’s state parks in the year ending June 30, 2020. As Isenhart notes, “Taking care of those facilities and the people who work there should be a top state priority.”

Isenhart’s bill would create a Safe Park Infrastructure Fund with $20 million of the funds the state received from the federal COVID-19 relief package. Of that, $4 million would be designated for the repair and renovation of those 23 facilities that house personnel at state parks.

That would be a great way to use this non-recurring revenue to address non-recurring expenses. Other ideas the state is considering would use this one-time windfall to reduce taxes or on expenses that are recurring. Doing either puts the state in a bad position when the surplus is depleted. Plus, this kind of investment in the state park houses would go a long way toward ensuring Iowa continues to get top-notch personnel to serve these treasured resources.

For years, Iowa officials have slashed funding directed toward state parks. Now the state is sitting on a $1.24 billion general fund surplus. During the past two years, our state parks have proven to be wildly popular among Iowans and visitors. Isenhart’s proposed measure makes sense for Iowa.

Let’s invest in Iowa parks to keep them strong for the future — and do it now when the state has the money to spend.

-Dubuque Telegraph-Herald