Privatization Issues

State Parks Embrace Business Tactics

Faced with dwindling budgets and mounting maintenance demands, state parks are developing their marketing and money-making skills. They are designing entrepreneurial programs to attract more visitors, reduce their dependence on state money and improve their overall financial viability.

  • Ohio campers can now rent cots, coolers, cookstoves and teepees at their parks.

  • Park revenues in the state have climbed from about $12 million to $21 million in six years.

  • Park-generated funds now account for about 41 percent of the Ohio Parks Department's annual budget -- up from about 23 percent six years ago.

  • Nationwide, state park budgets have fallen an average of about 22 percent since 1980, while funds for maintenance and capital improvements have dropped about 68 percent, according to the Political Economy Research Center.

Parks officials in New York formed a $2 million alliance with Coca-Cola -- whose products are now the official drink of the parks system.

Under an "entrepreneurial budget system" pioneered by Texas in 1993, parks there can keep as much as 35 percent of the revenue they generate beyond a targeted amount set at the beginning of each fiscal year.

Source: Terzah Ewing, "Meet the New Entrepreneurs: State Parks," Wall Street Journal, February 11, 1997.

Dallas Headquarters: 12770 Coit Rd., Suite 800 - Dallas, TX 75251-1339 - 972/386-6272 - Fax 972/386-0924
Washington Office: 601 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Suite 900 South Building - Washington, DC 20004 - 202/220-3082 - Fax 202/220-3096
© 2001 NCPA