Navajo Administrative History

Other natural resource management issues faced the monument. Although in essence, the monument was a biogeographic island, too small to sustain diversity without similar programs of management on surrounding land, there were unique natural features of the monument that merited saving. Two among the threatened species, Navajo Sedge (Carex Specuicola), a plant growing in the cracks of the canyon walls, and the Mexican subspecies of the Spotted Owl (Strix Occidentalis Lucida) were the subject of programs. In both cases, the research to support the program came from interested people outside the agency, suggesting a pattern of reaction in natural resource management at Navajo.

The interests and objectives of the Navajo Nation could also pose a threat to the values the NPS sought to protect. The prospect of a dam at the mouth of Tsegi Canyon with a permanent pool of 4,500 surface acres that would back into the Tsegi Tribal Park provided one example. The consequences of a human-made lake surrounding Betatakin and Keet Seel were vast. The increase in humidity from evaporation had the potential to accelerate the disintegration of surface ruins. Even informal discussion of such a proposal merited Park Service attention. [23]

But perhaps the greatest threat to the monument in the late 1980s and early 1990s was the lack of funding available for park programs. Higher visitation totals assured greater exposure in the 1980s, and the number of people who came up the approach road continued to grow. For Navajo National Monument, popularity had always been a mixed blessing. Visitors meant attention and support, but they also intruded on a delicate physical and archeological environment. In the fragile Tsegi area, even footsteps left a persistent imprint.

The pattern of underfunding was not new. Until MISSION 66, Navajo National Monument had largely been ignored by the Park Service. In the 1970s, when Frank Hastings arrived as superintendent, he found the perennial dilemma of funding to be his first and primary concern. Increases in visitation made funding for seasonals insufficient even before it was received, and during his tenure, the park received a steady but slow increase in outlay for ruins maintenance. Yet Hastings recalled, "it took a concentrated effort by the division chiefs and myself to increase funding to a reasonable level." [24]

During the 1980s, little occurred to alleviate the strain on the budget. Superintendents Miller and Gorman found themselves facing increasing demand for services with relatively constant staff and funding levels. New programs were nearly impossible to initiate for a lack of resources, and in some cases, existing programs were scrutinized to see if there was any room for further cuts. Over time, this eroded morale and made the park staff feel increasingly beleaguered.

The realities of the 1990s suggested that the situation would worsen significantly before it got better. In the aftermath of the savings and loan scandals and with a federal budget deficit approaching $300 billion, nearly every federal agency expected to be asked to do more with less. Navajo National Monument faced a more difficult reality than many park areas. Never developed with the emphasis on comprehensive visitor service characteristic of the major national parks and monuments, Navajo lacked a self-contained, self-supporting infrastructure capable of weathering an extended era of limited funding. It was as dependent on the Navajo reservation that surrounded it as was the reverse, and its position remained as precarious as it had ever been. Growing interest in Indians and cultural resources meant that the stream of visitors would continue to increase at precisely the time that the ability to serve them remained constant or in the most extreme of circumstances, decreased.

Growth compelled new arrangements, particularly with area Navajo people. Protection of three unconnected areas in a time of increasing traffic meant either greater vigilance or more complex arrangements with local landholders. The Memorandum of Agreement had been an interim step that over time had become a permanent agreement. It formalized a relationship appropriate for the 1960s, but at the dawn of the 1990s, NPS officials expected that it would require revision. Local Navajos were an important influence on the monument. Closer working arrangements could provide one answer to some of the problems of the monument.

At the dawn of the 1990s, Navajo National Monument faced a difficult situation likely to become more so. Individually, the threats to the park were not considered grave, but cumulatively they represented an obstacle to the fulfillment of the paradoxical preservation/use mandate of the Park Service. Park managers faced the problem of balancing greater demands and pressures with relatively constant levels of resources in an environment in which the Park Service lacked control of its destiny. By 1990, Navajo National Monument had become an island under stress.

The historic situation of the monument had changed. It was no longer isolated, protected by its remote nature and a difficult approach. The problems of Navajo National Monument were those of the rest of the park system, but the small size of the monument and its comparatively low visitation totals limited the support it received from agency coffers. Management of the monument was complicated by the logistical realities of the administration of three unconnected areas. The monument had nearly three times the protection needs of similar areas, but a similar level of resources for such duties. At Navajo, the Park Service was spread more thinly than at other similar areas.

This set of issues loomed large. In the 1990s, Navajo National Monument would continue to become more accessible. The leadership of the Park Service recognized that it could not rely on the remote nature of the park to protect it from depredation. As the number of visitors in the Southwest grows, visitors to the monument will also increase. Managing the impact of those people and the growth of extractive and industrial development on the reservation will play a major role in the future of the monument.