Nevada Park official: More money needed

Wednesday, April 12, 2000 | 11:26 a.m.

Parks Division Administrator Wayne Perock says only 35 percent to 38 percent of park visitors pay unless someone occupies the fee booths.

"Sometimes they pay a dollar, $5 or even occasionally $10, or more than the fee," Perock told the Legislature's Committee for the Fundamental Review of Base Budgets of State Agencies.

The parks system has 95 permanent employees to manage 24 state parks. The parks get about 3 million visitors a year. Two-thirds of them go to two parks - Valley of Fire northeast of Las Vegas and Sand Harbor on the shores of Lake Tahoe.

Perock said park use could be much higher, but the system has just 850 camping spaces, about the same as 20 years ago.

Often campers heading to Valley of Fire are turned away in the fall and spring in the middle of the week because no spaces are available.

The lack of staff also means the parks system offers few interpretative programs.

Because money is tight, Perock said he'd like to establish a nonprofit foundation for the system. This group then could seek grants that could be used for maintenance and growth.

"We have beautiful state parks," responded Assemblyman John Marvel, R-Battle Mountain. "It is our obligation to bring them up to standards."

But when Perock noted some parks outside Nevada are supported by room tax revenue, Marvel said, "The Legislature does not have an appetite for taxes."

Members of the committee chuckled when Perock and his staff mentioned problems with automatic fee pay machines at Valley of Fire.

These machines took credit cards, in addition to cash. But the machines malfunctioned and some visitors ended up paying the fee five times in one day. The machines were later removed.

"Every grocery store in the state can take a credit card and the customer gets the right receipt," said Sen. Bill O'Donnell, R-Las Vegas. "We ought to get our money back."

Perock said the machines were purchased in 1997, probably before the advent of current credit card technology.