Also, the report said, "Natural resources staff are unable to stem the invasion of nonnative plants and re-establish native vegetation largely as a result of limited budgets."

Henderson said in reaction, "I have spent 25 years in the Park Service in seven or eight parks. But I have never worked in a park yet that had all of the funding and all of the staffing that they needed. We certainly have shortfalls here" — but he said he could not verify whether they are as bad as the report says.

The report worried about threat to natural resources from development outside the park, plus the possibility of new road construction within it.

While oil and gas drilling are banned within the park, the report said areas just outside it are targets for possible development. It said one well is a mile from a park boundary in the northern Island in the Sky district.

Also, it said resources are threatened by the old Atlas uranium mill tailings across the river from the park near Moab, which leaches thousands of gallons of radioactive water into the river daily.

And the report worries about the possibility that local counties and the state may push to make new roads in the park on disputed claims made through an old law, called R.S. 2477.

The NPCA calls for more funding for the park, cleanup of the uranium tailings and ensuring that any R.S. 2477 road development does not degrade the park. More drastically, it calls for expanding park boundaries to incorporate an additional 500,000 acres of neighboring federal lands — which could ban oil and gas development there.

Henderson said the NPCA report is useful and is "kind of a validation of where we are trying to build programs over the past few years."

---

E-mail: lee@desnews.com