Advocates worry Joshua Tree graffiti could grow worse with national park layoffs

Widespread layoffs to the National Park Service are hitting hard locally, at Joshua Tree National Park.

Earlier this month, News Channel 3 covered the cuts to the park as locals and business owners claimed the downsizing would hurt the area.

Now, several park advocates fear vandalism could grow with less rangers supervising the land.

Casey Kiernan, owner of the Visit_JoshuaTree Instagram page, has lived near the park for more than a decade.

He hosts photography tours around the area and recently spotted several rocks tagged with graffiti about 10 miles past the western entrance of the park.

"It was just shocking to see. It was such a violation."

According to the National Park Service's website, the park is manned by nearly 100 full-time equivalent positions.

With positions cut under the Trump administration's downsizing of the federal government, Casey worries the already small staff now has even less resources to combat vandalism.

"Joshua Tree National Park is larger than the state of Rhode Island. And if you go to their website, to the national Parks website, there's a hiring page and and it says join our team of 100 people. So if you use that word, only about 100 people manage this area. That's the size of the state of Rhode Island."

Casey worries a park with less employees could leave the precious land vulnerable to worsening in condition, as he's seen the worst of an unattended park.

"We've seen that before if the park is unattended, it'll get trashed. When they've had shutdowns on the park, they sent home all the park rangers, but they left the gates open and the park was just flooded with people and it got destroyed. People were literally cutting down trees for firewood. There were spray painting and they were leaving trash all over. It was just terrible."

Now, he's hoping history doesn't repeat itself.

"There's something about the desert. People think that they're away from civilization so they can kind of do what they want and have a bonfire and play their music full blast. No, animals live here. People live here."

Joshua Tree locals are hosting a rally in support of National Parks on Saturday March 1 from 9:00 a.m. the the corner of Park Boulevard and Highway 62.