Budget Cuts Undermine Montana's Public Lands

Maintenance and upkeep of our public lands are not just line items in a budget. They're choices. We have a choice to ignore the lessons of history. We have a choice to silence cultural voices.

We have choices to risk safety, integrity, and education in service of austerity.

Yellowstone National Park attracted a record 566,363 visitors in May 2025, an eight percent increase from the previous year. The surge reflects a national love for public lands. Conservative estimates place the park’s annual economic contribution at over $828 million, supporting some 8,560 jobsin gateway towns like Gardiner.

While Yellowstone’s visitor-facing positions are mostly filled, the park has quietly lost up to 20 percent of its permanent workforce. Positions in conservation science, infrastructure oversight, and administrative operations have been left vacant.

The park’s gateway communities, such as Gardiner and Cooke City, have already expressed concern over reduced local economic activity and inconsistent park services in spite of record visitation.

Yellowstone faces increasing operational strain. Since January, mandates have trimmed nearly 25 percent of permanent park staff nationwide. Local impact is stark: numerous rangers and administrative positions were eliminated and a hiring freeze further pulled back crucial seasonal hires. Some have been replaced but lack the institutional knowledge of permanent staff.

Reduction in park staff has led to limited emergency response, longer wait times, and postponed infrastructure projects such as water, sewer, and trail repairs. Reports from park employees describe a summer overshadowed by understaffed facilities: overflowing toilets, vandalized trails, and diminished visitor services.

Significant infrastructure projects have been delayed or canceled.

Yellowstone was already carrying over $1 billion in deferred maintenance before these cuts took effect. The park had begun transforming key access routes by replacing the Lewis River Bridge ($37 million) and the Yellowstone River Bridge ($134 million), upgrading sewer systems at Mammoth ($43 million), and repairing employee housing ($30 million). Many of these projects were funded by the Great American Outdoors Act, designed specifically to eliminate backlog and improve visitor safety.

Recent proposals for $267 million in rescissions and the FY 26 budget that would slash nearly $900 million from NPS operational funding both threaten ongoing infrastructure work. Park leaders are directed to repeat maintenance work only when absolutely necessary, a shift that has frozen or delayed bridge upgrades, waste treatment upgrades, and road safety improvements. Campgrounds in Cooke, Canyon, and Mammoth risk temporary or prolonged closure. Visitor wait times, emergency response reliability, and ecosystem health are now at risk.

Big Hole Battlefield: Silence Replaces Interpretation

Big Hole National Battlefield is one of the most culturally significant places in Montana, marking the site of an 1877 attack on a Nez Perce encampment by U.S. troops. Today, the battlefield suffers from loss of staff and reduction of interpretive programming.

Big Hole shares its personnel with other units of the Nez Perce National Historical Park system. The staffing cuts have resulted in fewer guided tours, fewer cultural presentations, and longer delays in basic site maintenance.

Trails, fencing, and signage are degrading. Erosion control and monument stabilization are now reactive instead of planned. Cultural programs led by Indigenous educators and tribal liaisons have been canceled or sharply limited.

Big Hole functions as both memorial and classroom and reduced ranger presence weakens safety and visitor experience. Deferred maintenance can quickly compound. Trails left unmaintained may close. Historic monuments may degrade. Emergency repairs cost more. Like other sites, the park supports a local tourist economy. Impacts on visitation directly affect livelihoods in small Montana towns.

Cultural and ceremonial programming is critical to preserving Indigenous memory and community ties. Cuts threaten that legacy.

Grant-Kohrs: No Ranch Hands

Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Historic Site is one of the only working historic ranches in the National Park system. Located in Deer Lodge, Montana, it preserves the legacy of open-range ranching and serves as a cultural and educational destination for visitors across the country.

Over the past year, Grant-Kohrs has become a symbol of operational strain.

The ranch relies heavily on seasonal and permanent staff borrowed from larger parks in the region, including Glacier and Yellowstone. Shared fire management crews are specialized teams responsible for maintaining safe and functional irrigation ditches through prescribed burns and brush clearing. At Grant-Kohrs, the work is not so much about wildfire containment as water flow and land stewardship.

With staff reductions across the National Park Service, these support crews have been scaled back or reassigned to higher-priority areas. Internal maintenance teams are now short-handed. Public access to irrigation and cattle care events has been reduced. The site has no on-site administrative officer and is currently overseen remotely by the Glacier Park superintendent.

Federal budget cuts have not only undermined the function of the park. They've also weakened Deer Lodge’s seasonal economy and diminished one of the state’s most authentic heritage experiences.

Little Bighorn: Under Pressure

Little Bighorn Battlefield stands as a sacred memorial in southern Montana. Visitor traffic has more than tripled since the 1950s, with over 300,000 annual visitors now walking its paths. The site preserves the history of the 1876 battle and serves as an economic and cultural anchor for the region.

Little Bighorn is undergoing critical improvements: a new Visitor Center and upgrades to roads and ADA-accessible parking. Cuts to NPS operations and staffing threaten momentum just as final project phases are underway. Reduced on-site staff may limit safety monitoring, educational oversight, and visitor support during heavy construction activity.

Placards, guided walks, and tribal-led ceremonies require ranger and interpreter staffing. Budget cuts are already shrinking public programming at Little Bighorn. NPCA (National Parks Conservation Association) flagged this site as a “poster child for funding shortfalls” impacting interpretive services.

Montana’s other historical sites, including Little Bighorn Battlefield, Fort Union Trading Post, and Bear Paw Battlefield, are all experiencing similar constraints. Many share staff across state lines or rely on minimal NPS presence to remain operational. Cultural preservation efforts have been postponed. Grant writing teams and tribal engagement programs have been eliminated or deprioritized.

Loss of staffing capacity risks silencing Indigenous voices and diminishing the memorial’s educational mission. Every program reduction erases a layer of historical complexity and cultural memory.

Little Bighorn supports an estimated 187 regional jobs and generated $10 million annually before the cuts. Ancillary businesses from hotels to gas stations rely on park visitation. Any decline in programming or extended weekday closures reduces travel incentive. Visitors may avoid the site altogether if learning opportunities and safety assurances fade.

Bighorn Canyon: Backlogged and Forgotten

Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area has more than $72 million in deferred maintenance, including $1.2 million in trail repairs and over $500,000 in campground and recreation facility upgrades.

Trail maintenance teams have been disbanded or consolidated, leaving hundreds of miles of paths without regular inspection or upkeep. Reported issues include fallen trees, eroded trail surfaces, broken railings, and overgrown vegetation. Picnic areas and boat ramps are showing signs of disrepair from weather and heavy use, without sufficient staff to address them.

Visitor safety and access are increasingly in question. The canyon attracts thousands of visitors annually but has received little public attention compared to larger parks.

Repairs to Yellowtail Dam access roads, scheduled under the Federal Lands Transportation Program, are being deferred as crews focus on emergency needs.

Every deferred repair diminishes the visitor experience. Each compromised site weakens the economy of surrounding towns. Deferred infrastructure preservation consumes future budgets at higher cost, with permanent environmental damage.

Bighorn Canyon’s infrastructure is crumbling under a budget collapse. Deferred maintenance on trails, recreation sites, and access roads erodes public access. Visitor safety is compromised. Treasury costs will rise. Rural economies will suffer. This is happening now.

Legacy Sites at Risk

Montana is home to several other National Park units whose losses receive less public attention but carry deep cultural and historical consequences.

Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site, located at the Montana–North Dakota border, interprets the role of trade and diplomacy among Indigenous nations, trappers, and settlers. Budget reductions have curtailed ranger-led tours and public interpretation at the reconstructed fort, weakening one of the region’s most meaningful cross-cultural narratives.

Bear Paw Battlefield, part of the Nez Perce National Historical Park, marks the surrender site of the Nez Perce in 1877. Staffing reductions have eliminated and reduced youth and tribal programming. Educators and cultural liaisons no longer lead events that once connected present-day tribal members to ancestral lands.

Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, with key segments in Montana, has lost signage upkeep and interpretive staffing along rivers and crossings. Federal rescissions have diminished local partnerships that once supported community-led trail maintenance and education.

While such sites may not draw the millions of visitors that Glacier or Yellowstone attract, they remain integral to Montana’s cultural fabric. The loss of staff, programming, and preservation funds in these quieter corners reflects a national disinvestment in the full American story.

What the Cuts Reveal

Montana’s national parks and public lands are pillars of our state identity, our economy, and our democratic promise. When that promise is broken, it breaks hardest in places like Big Hole National Battlefield, where there's no backup and no spotlight.

The erosion may not appear dramatic. It arrives not with closure signs, but with an empty ranger desk, a closed road or a canceled school trip.

Daines has done absolutely nothing to stop it.

If Congress will not act to reverse these cuts, then voters must. The cost of inaction is a legacy lost.

Call Steve Daines in Washington and demand he honor the legacy of our public heritage: 202-224-2651.