Stymied at Zion by restrooms, or The rectum rules Zion

Kadizzle is a hard core liberal, but his experience at Zion National Park today certainly gave him insight into why conservatives think the government cannot do anything right. Prior to our drive to Zion today we checked the Zion web site. The web site indicated we could stay in the Watchman campground without a reservation. However when we reached the campground we were told it was full. After visiting Zion for five years at this time of year with no problems this seemed perplexing. A little investigation indicated there where sixty unused camping spots that were closed to the public because there was no one to clean the rest rooms. Kadizzle volunteered to clean the rest rooms, but this was to no avail. Campsites at Zion are $19 a night. So if the campground was open Zion could potentially make roughly $1,200 a night. It would seem like this would be enough to clean the rest rooms. Only the government could come to the conclusion the best thing to do was close the restroom and turn away campers. Of course when people are forced to leave the park because no camping is available it hurts the little towns like Springdale that rely on tourist for income. This is all being done when we are trying to stimulate the economy.

Often when these strange management decisions are made that make absolutely no sense, there is a hidden agenda. In this case it seems the National Park Service wants to irritate the public. The net result in the eyes of the Park Service is to get irritated citizens to complain to congress that the Park Service needs more funding. In other words if you give us some money, we can clean the restrooms, and you can camp. This is how the mind of a bureaucrat works. According to various park personnel there were a variety of reasons the campground was closed. All seemed suspicious. One person said they had to close the campground to spray weeds. In past years they would just rope off a couple of spots at a time and spray the weeds. Another person said it was due to irrigation. We have been here before and the irrigation ditches were running with no problem for the campers. Now, back to the restrooms being clean. Our camper has it's own restroom, like most campers do these days, so we could camp there and not even need the restroom. They could open the campground for self contained campers only. The audacity of the Park Service to so blatantly disregard the people they are meant to serve is astounding. Kadizzle likes to have faith in his government and the people who work for it, but this experience is making the most hard core liberal into a Rush Limbaugh lunatic.

At one time Kadizzle sought a career in Park Management. To this end he was in graduate school in West Virginia. To his amazement they actually taught him in graduate school the ins and outs of carefully pissing off the public. The first instance of this tactic he ever saw was at Bear Tooth Pass in Montana. The pass is a popular tourist place. At the top of the pass is a restroom. Almost everyone stops at the top of the pass to take advantage of the view, and use the restroom. One summer when we reached the top there was a big sign on the restroom. Guess who put it there? Yup the park serviced said the restroom was closed due to lack of funding. Later we found restrooms in very remote locations being taken care of and cleaned. It was evident this was a political move. One thing they taught us in graduate school about park management was that parks revolve around restrooms. People insist they are clean and available, and apparently they are the key political weapon. The park system does not have me by the balls, but apparently they have found something nearby that works equally well.