By Kevin Proescholdt and George Nickas, Wilderness Watch
The news is filled with stories of how the Trump administration and its so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have fired thousands of federal employees who work for our public land agencies. Though Trump had been talking about gutting the federal workforce, the way it was done without regard for how it would affect the agencies’ ability to carry out their responsibilities came as quite a shock.
As one U.S. Forest Service wilderness ranger wrote in a recent Wilderness Watch blog:
“The dust has had time to settle, and we can now assess the damage. All probationary Forest Service employees in ‘non-fire’ positions were fired. There are almost no wilderness rangers left in my state and many of my neighboring states. Beyond Wilderness, there are almost no field-going recreation employees left. The temporaries are gone, the permanent seasonals are gone. Without staff, many ranger districts will struggle to even utilize volunteers.”
In a recent meeting that Wilderness Watch attended, the Forest Service described the impacts of cuts to the Alpine Lakes Wilderness in central Washington. The popular and spectacular Enchantments area of the Wilderness typically has 10-12 wilderness rangers each summer who patrol and clean up after the 100,000 visitors that descend on the area each year. This year there will be only one wilderness ranger, who will have to share their time between the Enchantments and another 150,000 acres of Wilderness on the ranger district. It’s an utterly impossible task that will result in significant damage to these priceless lands. Similar stories are playing out in other Wildernesses as the Trump cuts kick in.
The layoffs, firings, and forced early retirements didn’t just hit field-going crews. For the Forest Service, the national program leader has left, and eight of the nine regional offices are now without wilderness staff. Major cuts have hit Bureau of Land Management (BLM), National Park Service, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service programs as well. The combination of chaotic firings and early retirements means the most experienced agency wilderness people are now gone.
Yet the untold story is that the downfall of wilderness programs has been a long time in the making. By the time Trump and Musk started recklessly eliminating jobs, Wilderness was one of the areas already hardest hit—not because of sheer numbers laid off or fired, but because there were already relatively few wilderness staff left. This is especially true for the Forest Service, which historically had far and away the most robust wilderness program, but has been gradually shrinking its wilderness crews for years.
The Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness (SBW) straddling the Bitterroot Mountains along the Montana-Idaho border is a case in point. At more than 1.3 million acres, the SBW is the third largest national forest Wilderness in the entire country. In the early 1990s, the SBW had nine permanent wilderness rangers, eight seasonal wilderness rangers, an entire ranger district—the Moose Creek Ranger District—dedicated solely to the SBW, and a wilderness coordinator for the wilderness programs across the six ranger districts and three national forests that oversee the SBW. By 2019, however, this robust wilderness program had dwindled to just three permanent and one seasonal wilderness rangers. The coordinator position was gone, and the Moose Creek District had been merged with an adjacent multiple-use district.
Last fall, things got even worse, even before DOGE and Trump, when then-Forest Service Chief Randy Moore announced that in 2025 there would be no hiring of temporary (seasonal) employees—a group that has historically made up a significant number of wilderness rangers and trail crew. For many Wildernesses, Moore’s edict was going to result in no field presence at all. And numbers tell only part of the story. What was also being lost was decades of institutional knowledge, the traditional skills necessary to steward Wilderness, and a voice within the agencies standing up for Wilderness when harmful projects are planned.
Wilderness Watch had raised this concern for decades, but it had been ignored by agency leaders, Congress, and the media. The Forest Service, and to a lesser extent the BLM, tried to cover up their lack of commitment to their wilderness programs by bringing on volunteers to replace professional, seasoned rangers. But now there aren’t enough rangers to even manage the volunteers, so in most cases much of that help is now gone too.
So, what can be done? In the short term, we can hope that the recent DOGE firings will be reversed, either by the courts or by urging our elected officials to restore funding for the agency programs. That could help hold off some of the damage that will undoubtedly occur over the next few years. And we must all redouble our efforts to push back against destructive proposals we know are headed our way.
Longer term, we need a durable response to the decades- long neglect and animus toward Wilderness that, for many years, has been the hallmark of the four agencies that manage Wilderness. We need a fundamental change to how Wilderness is administered and safeguarded across the land.
Twenty-five years ago, the four federal land agencies commissioned the Pinchot Institute for Conservation to do an assessment of their wilderness programs. The panel consisted of a number of wilderness luminaries, and it took input from wilderness conservationists and wilderness critics around the country. But it spent most of its time talking with federal agency wilderness leaders themselves. The report recognized the unique challenges of protecting and preserving Wilderness and the dedication of many of the staff involved, but nonetheless concluded that the agencies’ collective lack of commitment would lead to the eventual loss of the Wilderness System.
One of the panelists, former Secretary of Interior Stewart Udall, who served in both Congress and the Cabinet (as well as on the Wilderness Watch board of directors), was unequivocal in his conclusion that the four land management agencies weren’t up to the task. He urged the panel to recommend that the overarching responsibilities for Wilderness be placed in a new agency, one dedicated solely to the wilderness task. In calling for creating a new “National Wilderness Service,” Udall wrote:
“We must show the courage to suggest and promote alternatives that will create real change. We should pursue them with the energy and boldness of people like Bob Marshall and Howard Zahniser, who promoted an idea that seemed extreme in their day, but that most Americans now take for granted.”
When the dust settles, attempting to recreate the situation that existed prior to the Trump raids would be a fool’s errand, destined to condemn our precious National Wilderness Preservation System to the dustbin of history. Rather, we should see the near total elimination of the current failing programs as an opportunity to create something much better, a new entity that is passionate about the challenge of protecting and preserving our incomparable National Wilderness Preservation System. Udall’s call for a National Wilderness Service totally dedicated to that cause, and filled with public servants truly committed to that charge, is a great place to start.
Kevin Proescholdt is the conservation director and George Nickas is the executive director of Wilderness Watch.
Photo: Trail crew in the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness by USFS
220 Comments
when are we going to do the right thing?
I have been reading books and articles, viewing videos and following the agencies that manage this country’s lands. Whatever we do not do, however we let go of this continents flora and fauna, there is no return to what we had. The legislation which laid out what we needed to maintain our land and the legislation which provided protections for species that were disappearing or were endangered by us, by Humans, were not arbitrary considerations, but were backed by science and research. If one does not know that, if one does not think that the Human species is the single, most dangerous species on this planet, and the same Human species can create, control, define, maintain what is most necessary on this planet, then that is shameful.
THIS IS SO WRONG.
DON’T KNOW HOW TO FIX.
MUST TRY.
WE NEED TO PROTECT ALL PUBLIC LANDS AND FORESTS AND whatever they are called for our children and grandchildren
power to the people
we may only have one chance to protect the lands
thank you very much
Yay we need to keep them in their good work going to help people and stay strong. Thank you!
Kevin & George,
First off let me thank you for all of your efforts to inform and enlighten those who may not have the big picture which you did an excellent job of presenting here. As a young child, my dad who was a pilot for the USAF would take his leave when we “the kids” were on summer break. Pack up the station wagon with all 6 kids & our mom and set off around the country visiting numerous national parks and other wonderful natural wonders. By the time I was 12 years old we had driven and camped out in 46 of the 48 contiguous states. I’m lucky to still have the images of so many of our stops along the ways. I support 10-12 environmental organizations as I truly love our Mother Nature and all of her beauty. I’m truly saddened by the lack of respect, the powers that be are so clueless. Please don’t give up, I never will. And I will continue to support Wilderness Watch with contributions as I can. God Bless you both and those on your team taking the fight on.
Amen!
Wilderness, in all its diverse forms, is the very best of places America has to offer its citizens and visitors from around the world. Not only for recreational purposes but also for solitude, inspiration, artistry, listening, and contemplation. We have resplendent examples of Nature’s handiwork that shakes, shapes, and sustains our souls in times of trial and tribulation. It is for us to preserve these gifts of raw natural beauty, extraordinary places, not only for ourselves but for all future inhabitants of Planet Earth.
I wholeheartedly agree with Stewart Udall. Create a new entity that would protect the wilderness areas. The current system from the sounds of the report sounds broken for sure and perhaps non-existent. What does Trump and his lackeys know about forests, wildlife, and preservation of these entities anyway. This lack of irresponsible care for our wilderness areas has to stop. They will disappear and then what will we have; gas and oil fields and Trump golf courses?
Amen!
Save and protect the wilderness and stop firing people, they are badly needed.
The responsibilities for Wilderness need to be placed in a new agency dedicated to the wilderness task.
Our wilderness system needs the people who were laid off back to make sure they are protected from poachers and people who just go in their and destroy them. The last time this happened people even went into Joshua Tree National Park and cut trees down, trash was all over the place in them and a lot of other destructive things happened. We cannot afford a repeat of ignorance some people will do. Layoffs would leave many parks understaffed and facing difficult decisions about operating hours, public safety, and resource protection. We need them back and now.
Our precious and irreplaceable wilderness areas must have robust protections. Their loss would be an unforgivable mistake.
When the environment and public lands are political pawns, how much protection and higher options can happen? The wilderness needs an organization run by environmental scientists and monitored by the scientific community, not uninformed elected officials, or all will be lost.
Protect the forests, protect the natural landscape and the flora and forna contained within it.
Then protect the protectors of these amazing places.
TRUMP HATES THE CITIES. TRUMP HATES THE WILDERNESS. TRUMP LOVES HIS BILLIONAIRE DEVELOPER FRIENDS, AND HE LOVES ICE.
I worked as a back country ranger for Sequoia/Kings Canyon National Park back in the 1970s while living and working on the John Muir Trail. Without backcountry rangers who would be there to help all those hikers who don’t really know what they are doing or find those who get lost? I have picked up empty beer cans on the John Muir Trail 20+ miles from the nearest road because people would hike them in full, but be too lazy to carry the empties back out. I still feel a need to get back to the wilderness and hike in the mountains on a regular basis over 50 years later. A worId/country without wilderness would be a tragedy. I would love to see a National Wilderness Service as Mr. Udall proposed.
The Trump Administration has done so much damage to our wilderness that they and the law makers who supported them should all be thrown in jail. There is nobody to do that or to take our country in the right direction. I expect Mother Nature will have the final word and it won’t be pretty.
Wilderness belongs to all Americans so protecting and preserving it is the truly patriotic thing to do.
Remember more than 50% of educated, worldly, well informed voters, voted for Mr. Trump in spite of all the experiences during his first term. As you sow, so you reap!
An understaffed / barely staffed NPS does not serve any of us. It makes visting the parks less enjoyable for everyone. Please scale up hiring of park rangers to enhance everyone’s enjoyment.
As a true-believer in what Udall has done for our country and what he stands for, we must save our forests, wildernesses, waterways and so on. Here in New Mexico we are losing our forest and wilderness to fire. Most of the Gila has burned or is burning. Unfortunately, global warming is as dangerous or more than the Trump Administration. They are just the ones to finish the job. Unless people start to appreciate what we have and want to make changes to their lives, and be a part of the larger picture, how can we begin to save these special areas of our country. If anything, our children and grandchildren deserve more … So where do we begin …
I agree that a sustainable change must happen. Wilderness needs to be kept clean and wild somehow.
Sounds good! We have a mess to clean up already. Think this is a good place to start!
I am all for replacing what has been used in the past with a whole new approach if it is backed by science and enhances our planet instead of tearing it down.
I agree that creating an agency worthy of protecting wilderness is vital.
Wilderness is like our Constitution, it must be protected and preserved. Trump has no understanding of wilderness, after all who would understand wilderness if your toilets are gold plated.
It’s all backwards.
It’s all ignorant.
It’s all ridiculous.
Stop the stupidity NOW.
Protect the Parks.
Protect the kind folks that work there so we all can relish Nature.
It’s our birthright while on this Earth.
“Despite Human Ignorance, Nature Endures.”
But why should she have to go through hell & back because of others greed & ignorance?
SGMKJ
Our feckless president, who almost never goes outdoors except in transition to go back indoors elsewhere, is waging war on the natural environment. Once he wins this battle there will be no going back for any of us. Our wild places are being decimated, and will not be recoverable. Neither he nor any of his corrupt cronies will be able to take their ill-achieved money to another planet, nor will they be able to use it to restore a dying planet. We need environmental protections at all costs now!
Sincere thanks for your work, and I have no doubt many love wilderness as much as I do… BUT…Terms such as “management” of wilderness and “neglect ” of wilderness are unfortunately part of the underlying and subtly and subconsciously influential ANTHRONARCISSISTIC semantics that are PART OF THE PROBLEM. ie that we are so godlike as to control, and that we humans should value wilderness for what good it does for US, vs a more HOLISTICALLY expressed PUBLIC message that ALL BEINGS, i.e., anything that “be’s” from rock to stream to butterfly to bear to other human has just as much right to exist for their own sakes as we do, and need to be treated with respect and appreciation and self-restraint from our admitted POWER to manipulate things.. Our conflict-ridden tribalistic and myopically exploitative history as humans will not cease until we treat ALL BEINGS with greater respect. For each human to live, other beings and places must be affected, but doing so with awareness of the impacts of this necessity on other places and cultures and BEINGS is TOTALLY IGNORED in our incredibly myopic normalized grossly over-consumptive anthronarcissistic “modern” culture….death to the planet by one’s own daily added tiny 1000 cuts we have been self-propagandized into ignoring.
And the relatively recent push for “more access” to wild places by so many groups of purported “nature lovers”, hunters, e-bikers, climbers, etc., is best pointed out for its folly by Yogi Berra’s quote “No one goes there any more…It’s too crowded!” Humans need to learn how to leave places ALONE ! We are NOT good at that !
No words, just extreme sadness!
if you have Fewer staff this will impact the wild lands. we need a durable response to the decades- long neglect and animus toward Wilderness that, for many years, has been the hallmark of the four agencies that manage Wilderness. We need a fundamental change to how Wilderness is administered and safeguarded across the land.
We get just one chance to save wilderness. Once altered, it can never be truly restored. We should prioritize saving as much as we can while we still have the chance to do so
Thank you for this, so sad and true. I will forward this to others that use and enjoy these places. Time to take action.
We need to protect the wilderness!
I support Udall’s proposal for a new wilderness service, what the WW refers to as a National Wilderness Service, to replace the current failing wilderness agencies that are being stripped of their work force. Let’s support the wilderness and wildlife for all humanity and the Earth.
I am all for this. How can we make permanent, positive change? We can’t go back and forth.
Leave future generations the beauty of the wilderness and nature to
continue to enjoy protect and pass on to more future generations.
Please protect the Wilderness Protection System. I spent hundreds of hours working to designate wilderness areas.
We ALL have a responsibility to work together in order to Protect and SAVE our Wilderness, Waterways and Environment from senseless Destruction and Poisoning in the name of Ignorance and Greed.
We have to SAVE OUR Public Lands, National Parks, National Monuments, and National Forests, which help protect and save our amazingly beautiful landscapes from poisoning and destruction and Wildlife from senseless harassment and killing from people who care about nothing except their own pocketbook.
We have to STOP the senseless killing of our Wildlife out of Ignorance and Greed!
I urge opposition to any bill that sells out wild animals and wild places!!!
Please restore funding for the wilderness park agency programs before the damage is permanent!
Please do all you can to preserve the wilderness for future generations…thank you, Fred
Preserve our National Wilderness Preservation System.
Wilderness rangers and others who serve in the field are needed to ensure visitors take care of the wild areas and to prevent potential problems in those areas from getting worse.
Wilderness needs protection, not “development” or exploitation.
YES! The only option here is for those of us who cherish public lands is to draft a new direction for management for public lands, including all agency wilderness, national parks, national conservation areas, and national monuments. The agencies formerly managing this conservation gems were a hodgepodge of mis-management and inefficiency. As a former NPS employee I worked aside the best people I ever met (my peers) and was abused the worst people I ever met (many of my supervisors). Public lands deserve so much better. We need to rebuild public land management anew and eliminate the bureaucratic ecosystem that allowed the worst of the worst to rise to the top of public service.
Your message is filled with hope!
Fewer staff, more visitors leaving more trash. What could possibly go wrong? A self answering question.
No rocket scientists needed. Oh right!!!!! There is less of them also through firings.
Infinite wisdom at work here from ignorant lazy incompetents.
This a great piece that hits the nail on the head! The DOGE cuts as explained here should shock and concern everyone who cares about Wilderness. Glad to see WW hammering on this unprecedented time for safeguarding our most pristine and special places. Keep the spotlight on this issue and your effective trumpets blaring! Thank you.
I’m glad the BLM is losing employees. The first program they should eliminate is the unnecessary rounding up of American’s unique heritage, the Wild Horses.
We must show the courage to suggest and promote alternatives that will create real change.
This is well thought out and timely ..after the wrecking ball crew are long gone it behaves the new administration to follow Udall’s strategy. I will not be here for the implementation long term or the evolving implementation of a such a plan because it must look forward decades. I feel I should also add that the uptick of “tourons” intent on creating click bait for their YouTube pages has given us another significant problem of usage and brings up the age old question of how much use and by whom can the wilderness be asked to sustain. I am old school in that what went in comes out, wildlife is to be viewed from a distance and steps in the wilderness should be sacred and leave no lasting impression. I am mindful of the extreme position that many will attribute to this outlook but a recent expedition through the Upper Volta wildness area went through areas that had never experienced the human footprint. The expedition leaders and the followers with a human pack train commented that these pristine areas would never again return to the absolute condition that existed before their passage. The wilderness house should be just that and the right to enter a careful and calculated decision based on the impact history. I loved your article, hence my response. In the early 1980’s I trained in North Central British Columbia on forest service trails. These were minimally maintained if at all and I was struck as to how pristine these trails were and how in days of hard running and hiking I did not see another soul.
O lute
The effects of these budget changes caused by the Trump Administration affords a clear picture of the selfish theft attitude of President Trump.
Udall, as always, gets it right!
We need to do more and protect the wilderness in this world!
Thank you for this. What is happening is disheartening, discouraging and depressingly tragic. Your vision for a brighter future with a new plan is hopeful and inspirational.
It is undeniably imperative that staff members get rehired and/or new ones employed into Bureau of Land Management (BLM), National Park Service, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service programs, just to name a few. The future of the natural world, and by extension, the future of humanity, depends on having enough staff members to safeguard the future of the flora, fauna, and the natural wildernesses that mankind also depends on.
We cannot let the degradation of our wild places happen! If Americans love our parks and monuments, we must act out! No one should be ok with exploratory mining and drilling or logging equipment showing up at park gates! We need to start an August opposition and protest in person where the government shows up ready to destruct our public lands. We need alot of press coverage. We need to hear from our top environmentalists right away. This is not a foregone conclusion. And we can’t put it back once its gone. WAKE UP EVERYBODY! EXPRESS YOURSELVES AND DO WHAT YOU CAN TO SHOW UP AND RESIST!
For mother earth. Our home.
Kathleen, I agree with your comment 💯! We all must stand up, speak up & push back against Trump’s toxic, cruel & corrupt administration! It’s obvious he doesn’t care at all about preserving America’s Wilderness or the Environment in general! Trump views it all as a “commodity” he can exploit for financial gain! All the Environmental Protections & Clean Energy Incentives have been Cut & Rolled Back! It’s just disgraceful!
Protect our National Wilderness. Many people want wildlife protected from extinction. Ruining their habitat is not an option. Rangers are being fired for no reason. Please protect and preserve our National Forests.
Our government needs to care more and do more protecting of our precious environment.