Battered national parks and hotels appeal for end to shutdown as Utah pays for reopenings

Though the government may be shut down, the tourism industry is working full steam toward reaching workable solutions for its reopening.

One such move occurred today when Utah’s Department of Natural Resources, a division of its state parks, wired $1.67 million to the federal government to reopen five of the state’s national parks – Arches, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef and Zion – along with the Glen Canyon/Lake Powell national recreation area and Cedar Breaks and Natural Bridges national monuments, for 10 days.

The action came through discussions between Gov. Gary Herbert and U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Sally Jewell. “For the entire state of Utah, the month of October represents about 10% of our net revenue in tourism, or $100 million,” Ally Isom, Herbert’s deputy chief of staff, told Yahoo Travel. “This is important to these local communities who are economically hemorrhaging income that can’t be made up in the month of January.”

As for the $1.67 million, Isom said Utah is anticipating being reimbursed when the federal government is operational again. In the meantime, Herbert’s office has been receiving calls from other states looking to emulate Utah’s move. “The Department of the Interior was careful in crafting contracts to ensure a model could be applied to other states as well,” Isom said. “We know a number of other states considering the same arrangement and we’d certainly lock arms with them as we pursue reimbursement.”

Among those states is Arizona. “Our local economy is losing $1.5 million a day because of the shutdown and our small businesses are being devastated,” Debbie Johnson, president and CEO of the Arizona Lodging and Tourism Association, told Yahoo Travel. “Not only is Grand Canyon National Park closed, but a dozen other Arizona parks and national monuments as well.”

Some staggering statistics are making the rounds. A report released by the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees (CNPSR) set out the following numbers: 715,000 visitors lost daily based on October 2012 national park attendance numbers, $76 million in lost visitor spending per day and $450,000 in lost revenue each day that would go directly to the National Park Service ($300,000 in entrance fees and $150,000 in other in-park expenditures, such as campground fees, boat rentals, etc.).

The CNPSR’s stats for Grand Canyon National Park: 120,000 lost visitors in the first 10 days of the shutdown, $11,750,684 lost visitor dollars in first 10 days, and 6,825 total jobs at stake, including 6,167 local/non-National Park Service jobs.

Hotels neighboring national parks also feel the impact. Katie Merrill, a spokeswoman for the hotel search site Trivago, told Yahoo Travel that a company survey looking at the 10 days leading up to the shutdown and 10 days since shows sharp decreases in areas with national parks, such as 44% in Yellowstone, 29% for Yosemite and 50% for Jackson, Wyo.

As for Arizona tourism, it’s taking action by reaching out to both federal and local officials in pleas to end the shutdown, which Johnson says is leading to hundreds of layoffs. She also points to Arizona’s hotel industry, which has been particularly hard hit. “One of our hotels would normally be at 95% occupancy this time of year, but is in the 30s.”

Losses like these led the American Hotel Lodging Association to send a letter on Thursday to President Obama and members of the House and Senate urging them to reach an immediate agreement. The letter states, “Analysts say that for each day the federal government is shut down, collective American income is reduced approximately $200 million, and our nation’s hotels are losing more than $8 million in economic activity – putting jobs at risk and causing repercussions across many other related sectors. Communities near national parks are expected to lose $76 million a day in visitor spending.”

Why the AH&LA wants to make the administration aware of these statistics? “We feel it’s important for members of Congress and the President to understand and recognize that this shutdown has real impact on the lodging industry, which has been a bright spot in our economic recovery,” AH&LA’s Senior Vice President and Department Head of Governmental Affairs Vanessa Sinders said. “We’ve had 12 quarters of growth, providing jobs and economic power in every state and every congressional district, and the shutdown is impacting that. We want to keep contributing to economy and providing jobs.”

Members of AH&LA who signed the letter, including tourism industry professionals from state associations and general managers to hotel brands, have felt the shutdown’s impact from Tennessee to Arizona. “One of our members, a hotel property in Colorado, received two government-related cancellations for bookings for this week, costing them over $60,000 in lost revenue; a loss they’ll unlikely make up,” says Sinders. “Hotel bookings near national parks are down and properties in and around D.C. have lost more than 10% in bookings, a hit on both governmental and leisure travel. We’ve even heard from members on the West Coast who’ve received calls from Canada asking if the border is open.”

The response from the administration and Congress to AH&LA’s letter has been positive, Sinders said. “There are different Senate and House hearings going on and our letter has been helpful in explaining and quantifying the shutdown’s impact on our industry.”