Volunteer group supports state parks we all should enjoy

By Richard N. Velotta (contact)

Fri, Feb 20, 2009 (2 a.m.)

In September my wife and I took a wonderful day-trip via U.S. 93 to a couple of our state parks.

We started with the two-hours-plus drive to Caliente’s outskirts where, at an opening in Rainbow Canyon, State Route 317 emerges. About three miles in from U.S. 93 is the entrance to Kershaw-Ryan State Park. The park is only about a half mile off Route 317 in a steep narrow canyon.

Kershaw-Ryan is a surprising oasis within a rugged desert landscape. Early settlers cultivated a garden of grapevines, trees and grass. Today it’s a shady developed picnic area.

A concrete-lined pool was built to capture spring water.

The canyon walls and the placid grounds provide a relaxing escape from Strip traffic and the crowds of our busy neon home.

The day my wife and I went — a Saturday — a family was celebrating a birthday and the children were paddling around in the pool.

In another picnic area, a woman and her daughter found a peaceful corner to just sit and enjoy the outdoors.

My wife and I looked at each other and we agreed: Why did it take us so long to make our way here?

After our picnic lunch, we got back on U.S. 93 and drove another 20 minutes toward Panaca and made a stop at Cathedral Gorge State Park.

I’d been to Cathedral Gorge four months earlier because it was one of the stops for the Nevada Tourism Commission’s “Nevada Passage” made-for-TV outdoor competition to showcase the state’s rural attractions.

Cathedral Gorge is a geologic oddity where erosion has carved a group of cathedrallike spires and caves into the soft bentonite clay. You can walk 30 to 40 feet up some of the passageways cut into the rock. At the end of the passages, the width of the canyons narrow to just a couple of feet and the walls rise 50 feet above you.

I was so taken by the place that I took relatives to see it in late December when snow covered the ground and there were only two other people in the park.

Unfortunately, my wife and I nor anybody else will be able to picnic as much at Kershaw-Ryan.

Recent cuts in personnel by the state has forced the seasonal closure of six of our 25 state parks, including Kershaw-Ryan.

Also closed is Beaver Dam, Dayton, Echo Canyon and Washoe Lake state parks and Ward Charcoal Ovens State Historic Park.

The state budget cuts for the next biennium could lead to even more slicing and dicing in the state park system.

But fortunately, there are means for the public to get involved in helping Nevada’s hidden treasures.

The little-known Nevada State Parks Cooperative Association, based in Las Vegas, has become more important than ever in the era of revenue declines and the necessity of chopping “frills” out of the budget.

Government departments that actually generate revenue for the state, such as the Tourism Department, aren’t the ones that should be cut beyond recognition.

The state’s parks, properly funded and nurtured, are another potential source of revenue.

The Nevada State Parks Cooperative Association is a nonprofit organization that supports the Nevada State Parks Division and has raised more than $330,000 in about 15 years.

Most of the revenue generated is through product sales at state park visitor centers. But the association isn’t just a concessionaire. The products it sells must be interpretive. In other words, they have to somehow be connected to something educational, something natural, historic or archaeological.

Sure, it sells T-shirts and hats — but they are illustrated with the flora and fauna of the area or with images from the park.

“We aren’t going to sell shirts with flames on them at Valley of Fire, for example,” said Karen Moessner, who became the association’s first executive director in May 2007.

Valley of Fire, about 50 miles northeast of Las Vegas, incidentally, is the state’s most visited park, thanks to hundreds of people taken there by tour buses.

The association’s policy is developed by a five-member board that meets once a month. Currently that board is composed of Chairman Danny Riddle, secretary Helen Mortenson and members Jean Miller, Ginny Selwood and Lea Mills.

Moessner said she hopes to expand the volunteer board by up to four members, so anyone interested in the organization’s mission is encouraged to contact her at 540-4279. She’s also considering branching out to the northern part of the state to get support and ideas from the Reno area and the rural counties.

At its meetings, the board discusses ways to improve visibility and sales in the parks and how to turn the money generated into interpretive park projects and training.

Among the projects are interpretive trail signs, scenic byways, restorations, information boards, park collateral material, photographic equipment, museum audio programs, portable sound systems, amphitheater benches, petroglyph protection and taxidermy.

“We fund park projects such as display materials or objects pertaining to the history or natural history of the area for the purpose of adding them to the museum collections of the (State Parks Division),” Moessner said.

During the summer months — the busiest time of the year for the parks — money will be raised with concession sales, and a new grant cycle will begin Oct. 1 with awards being made by Nov. 1.

“We have some of our meetings at the parks so that we can see them and some of the things we talk about firsthand,” Moessner said. “It’s a great way to get involved and see some of the parks at the same time.”

Victim of success

There are plenty of things to take away from last week’s well-publicized spat between Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, who heads the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, and President Barack Obama.

My list of key take-aways:

• That Obama made an unfortunate choice of words when making the point that any business or organization that takes bailout money shouldn’t use it for rewards or bonuses and that he meant no disrespect to Las Vegas as a destination.

• That millions of people who failed to read or hear Obama’s entire remark in context may think he meant that people literally shouldn’t visit Las Vegas — and that’s what’s got our local tourism leaders so upset.

• That the mayor, who frequently uses hyperbole to make a point, found a way to draw attention to issues affecting the conventions and meetings industry and how Las Vegas is the market leader for serving that industry.

• And, that the public isn’t that sympathetic to the economic plight of our top industry.

One other thing to note is that local tourism leaders have done such a great job of selling Las Vegas as a place to get away and have fun that the public doesn’t realize what a great convention and meetings venue it is. One reason is that the public sees and identifies Las Vegas with “What happens here, stays here,” and similar ad campaigns. The success of that branding effort has suddenly victimized us. And those who say we can’t have it both ways are wrong.

The promotion for meetings and conventions generally goes to trade publications, and the public rarely sees that side of our resorts’ marketing efforts.

Awhile back, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority had a business campaign called “We work as hard as we play,” to convey that local resorts have second-to-none meeting facilities to conduct business and that when business is wrapped up for the day, there’s an opportunity to entertain clients in our restaurants and shows.

It’s likely the authority will roll out a similar campaign in the weeks ahead to reverse the inadvertent damage done by Obama’s remark and the subsequent debate over what he meant and whether he should or shouldn’t apologize or even clarify it.

And don’t be surprised if that campaign is more publicly distributed so that the nation gets it that Las Vegas is much more than fun and games.

Raising the Bar

Kudos to Dallas Morning News aviation blogger Terry Maxon, who pointed out to readers last week that Sports Illustrated model Bar Refaeli, whose image is on the cover of this year’s swimsuit edition as well as one of Southwest Airlines’ Boeing 737 jets, is flying with considerably less on than San Diego resident Kyla Ebbert, who was almost booted from a Southwest flight to Phoenix because her clothing was too revealing.

She ended up getting on the flight after she covered up, but the incident caused a big commotion for Southwest, and Ebbert ended up pitching for Virgin America on a flight from San Francisco to Las Vegas with the airline’s financial backer, adventurer-entrepreneur Richard Branson.

Most of the publicity on Southwest’s newest flying billboard has been positive.

One of the newly wrapped plane’s flights was from New York’s LaGuardia International Airport to Las Vegas last week to deliver 18 swimsuit models to the city for a series of appearances sponsored by the magazine, the airline and the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.

W-Fli

If you’re flying on Southwest Airlines to or from Las Vegas anytime soon, you’ll have a one in 536 chance of getting on the one Boeing 737 jet that is equipped with free high-speed Wi-Fi Internet access that you can use while flying. By early March the odds improve to one chance in 134 when the airline equips three more planes with its new service powered by Westlake Village, Calif.-based Row 44.

Southwest launched the new service last week and is letting passengers try it out for free during beta testing. If the Federal Communications Commission approves the system, it should be available on more planes later this year. Southwest hasn’t determined how much it will cost passengers to use when the service is available, but Row 44 officials have been quoted as saying it would be under $10.

Unlike other Wi-Fi systems being tested by Delta, American and United that use ground-to-air Internet connections, Southwest is using satellite technology. You’ll be able to identify Southwest’s Wi-Fi equipped planes because they’ll have a small disc-shaped protrusion just in front of the plane’s tail.

Although some are skeptical about the value of in-flight Wi-Fi on Southwest, considering that many of its flights are short in duration, others are welcoming the airline’s new connection to cyberspace.

An engadget.com reader, apparently from the West Coast, offered this posting in response to the news: “Only 45 minutes to Vegas. Just enough time to make a hotel reservation on your way.”

Richard N. Velotta covers tourism for In Business Las Vegas and its sister publication, the Las Vegas Sun. He can be reached at 259-4061 or at rick.velotta@lasvegassun.com.