Over the last eight months, as part of President Donald Trump’s efforts to slash the federal bureaucracy, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has targeted the National Park Service (NPS) with unprecedented funding disruptions and staffing reductions. These abrupt cuts have sown chaos across the National Park System, and Fire Island National Seashore (FINS) has not emerged unscathed. FINS staff are stretched thin and existentially stressed; the Fire Island Lighthouse renovation has been delayed by years, and the seashore has been pushed into unprecedented territory.
According to reporting from various national media outlets, including HuffPost and PBS News Hour, NPS employees nationwide have been pushed to their limits through indiscriminate mass firings (for instance, of probationary workers), deferred resignation deals, and early retirements—reducing overall staff and threatening the institutional knowledge needed to run and protect America’s national parks.
Hiring freezes and general uncertainty have made it harder to replace essential talent that is being lost, and they have even delayed the hiring of seasonal workers needed for the peak summer tourist season. Advocates are warning national media outlets that funding and staff cuts will degrade the visitor experience with more litter on trails, no toilet paper in bathrooms, less-maintained facilities, less-protected natural and historic resources, and even threats to public safety. The NPS cuts have also triggered public protests by angry park lovers here on Fire Island and elsewhere across the country.
These issues will likely be exacerbated by President Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which was signed back in July. According to PBS News Hour, the new law rescinded $267 million previously earmarked for national park improvements. This cut to the NPS was passed by both houses of Congress and will therefore likely not be subject to the same sort of legal challenges that have dogged DOGE’s attempts to mass fire federal workers and prevent federal spending.
NPS cuts are causing major disruption not only in national parks nationwide, but also right here on Fire Island. The efforts of Fire Island News to explore the local impacts of these cuts were stymied by the culture of fear that has emerged in the current uncertain environment, with FINS staff mostly unwilling to speak on the record out of fear of retaliation.
Luckily, Jonathon Gaare, Executive Director of the Fire Island Lighthouse Preservation Society (FILPS), is no longer a federal employee and was able to shine some light on the situation and speak on behalf of his former colleagues. Before Gaare started his current position with FILPS, he served as an NPS ranger for five years on Fire Island and in several other park units.
“The biggest thing is the unknown for employees of the seashore,” Gaare explained, “that’s the biggest scare I think for them.” He later added that he was “saddened” because all his friends and peers at FINS are “stressed for their jobs and their careers.” He shared a story of a team of his former colleagues from a regional-level NPS engineering program known as HACE (Historic Architecture Conservation and Engineering Center) being fired and rehired on the same day to highlight the chaos currently plaguing NPS personnel.
Gaare said he was not aware of any FINS staff being fired outright as of mid-July, which would make FINS luckier than many other NPS units. Still, two permanent staff members took the “deferred resignation” deals offered by the administration and left their positions.
For context, the national seashore has “almost 40 permanent employees and as many as 60 additional seasonal and intern positions,” according to its website. Seasonal employees were impacted by a hiring freeze enacted by the administration across the federal government back in January, but were later exempted in response to public and congressional pressure. Still, the confusion delayed the typical hiring process, according to Gaare, with the start date for seasonal hires being postponed at least a month.
Gaare said FINS staff are “going above and beyond,” but “they’re spread thin,” adding that visitors may notice a “lack of ability to purchase simple supplies, to man bathrooms, [and] clean boardwalks” on the island. He also recalled, “When I started as a seasonal here, we would always have two, possibly more, [interpretive rangers] at each visitor center, and I do not think that’s the case now.”
He also highlighted that NPS cuts have caused a roadblock for the Fire Island Lighthouse restoration, as “funding for tower repairs has been delayed by quite a bunch of years.” When pushed for a timeline on the delays, he said the exact timing was “unknown” and that “nothing could be set in stone.”
Gaare added that FILPS “has had to take on a lot more minor repairs, you know, simple boardwalk [repairs] things that in the past the park would help us with.” However, they were happy taking on this role because FINS is “strapped and, you know, stressed for time and people.”
Fire Island News reached out to FINS Superintendent Alexcy Romero to ask if the NPS cuts had caused delays in other projects around the national seashore, including the repairs on the Talisman-Barrett Beach dock and the boardwalks at Watch Hill. Romero denied that the current administration’s policies had any impact on these two projects, instead blaming poor timing for the delays. The superintendent claims the damage to the Talisman-Barrett Beach dock and the boardwalks at Watch Hill had occurred too close to peak season for repairs to be contracted out and conducted in time. Whether to take these explanations at face value is best left to the judgment of readers.
Finally, when asked if the Trump administration’s NPS cuts had impacted FINS’ ecological conservation and monitoring, Romero said that the park’s endangered species program “remains robust.” Specifically, the superintendent
highlighted the piping plover monitoring program and celebrated that the seashore now has a record of around 85 nesting pairs of plovers.
Unfortunately, more funding trouble for the NPS and FINS may materialize soon. President Trump’s 2026 budget proposal calls for cutting the NPS budget by over $1 billion. It should be noted that presidential budgets are rarely adopted directly. According to reporting by The Washington Post, “the House is seeking a smaller $176 million cut and the Senate hopes to maintain funding levels.”
The National Park System generates $55.6 billion in economic value. The administration’s budget proposal includes language claiming that “NPS responsibilities include a large number of sites that are not ‘National Parks,’ in the traditionally understood sense, many of which receive small numbers of mostly local visitors, and are better categorized and managed as State-level parks. The Budget would continue supporting many national treasures, but there is an urgent need to streamline staffing and transfer certain properties to State-level management.”
In other words, the Trump administration’s proposed 2026 budget envisions dismantling of the National Park System and transferring many of its lands to state government control, but may not necessarily give states additional resources to preserve them.
If enacted, this idea would pose an existential threat to national parks and frontline communities nationwide, including Fire Island, as well as the ecosystems and communities that comprise our unique coastal landscape.
Thankfully, this nightmare scenario seems unlikely. The NPS enjoys widespread bipartisan support from the public, according to polling organizations like YouGov, and any plan to dismantle it would likely not gain support in Congress.
The administration is also seemingly pursuing other funding strategies, including forcing foreign tourists to pay higher entrance fees and possibly raiding other public land funds to pay for national park administration. Still, the threat of cuts to the NPS remains, even if they never reach the apocalyptically high numbers depicted in the administration’s 2026 budget proposal.
If you are concerned about the plight of our national parks, there are ways to help. Members of the public can play a significant role in assisting FINS and our other national parks through this challenging period. If you see litter on the beach or alongside a boardwalk, carry it out to the nearest trash can. Be kind to our stressed FINS rangers and staff, and always follow park rules.
If you have the means, consider donating money to FILPS to help restore our beautiful lighthouse to its former glory. It is important to remind our elected leaders that national parks are not a partisan issue and that many conservative voters care about national park conservation.
Our national parks are the birthright of all American citizens. These special places are our national heritage, and as Fire Islanders, FINS is not only our heritage; it is also our home.
