Local park managers stunned at closings

By LINDA THURSTON

LaFollette Press News Editor

Local park managers are stunned at closures announced this week, but they’re keeping a stiff

upper lip.

"I’m as amazed as everybody else that it has gotten to this point that we have to close," said Cove Lake State Park Manager Judy Wasik, who has been ordered to close her park on Mondays and Tuesdays effective this week.

"It’s a big blow. We’re just trying to adjust," said Fred Talley, manager of Norris Dam State Park, which along with Indian Mountain State Park is now closed on Mondays and Tuesdays and is slated for total closure on Nov. 30.

"Needless to say, we’re getting a lot of phone calls," said Jerome Cummins, ranger at Indian Mountain. "You’ve got people who have walked here religiously for years."

The state department of environment and conservation ordered the park closures citing lack of funds, but that logic is disputed by some.

Rep. Mark Goins said the legislature actually increased funding for state parks in this year’s budget, and said he was "outraged" by the planned closings.

"We are funding a $2.5 million boll weevil eradication project in West Tennessee for wealthy cotton farmers but we are closing state parks enjoyed by everyone. Where is the common sense in our government?"

Local walkers were quick to complain Tuesday morning when they were ejected from Cove Lake’s walking trails.

"I’ve never in my life had to send people out of the park," said Wasik. "But people have been very understanding."

Wasik said all the park’s shelters and the recreation center have already been booked through October, and people who have put deposits down on the facilities will have to come to the park office to apply for refunds.

Although fishing, tennis, volleyball, horseshoes and walking are prohibited on Mondays and Tuesdays, those using the campground will actually be evicted on Sunday nights so they won’t be in the park at midnight.

"Where do we send the campers?" Wasik mused, knowing that the other two parks in the county are also closed on the same schedule.

Howard Holdredge, president of Friends of Cove Lake, said he was dismayed by the announced closings.

"This is very disruptive for anybody who wants to use the facilities," he said. "I just hope it’s rectified soon."

Ironically, his organization, which has raised thousands of dollars for park improvements and maintenance, has been meeting on the second Tuesday of every month and will now have to move its meetings to Wednesdays. Holdredge urged more people to join the Friends group.

"You just take Cove Lake for granted, and we could lose it," he fretted. "We’re just thankful they’re not completely closing our park."

Talley expressed disagreement with the state’s figures that Norris Dam lost over $500,000

last year.

"Technically, you don’t lose money when you operate on appropriations," he noted, since the state projects the revenues expected from the park and then appropriates an estimated amount to cover the shortfall. The half-million dollar figure is not a net loss, he said. "That’s what it costs to operate the park."

In fact, Kim Olson, spokeswoman for the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, admitted Wednesday that every state park in Tennessee loses money.

Talley said the figures also ignore the sales tax revenue park visitors generate outside the park in the local communities, including the occupancy tax levied on users of the park’s 85 campsites and 29 cabins in Anderson County.

Perhaps most ironic is the fact that while Talley sits in his office dealing with the planned shutdown, workers are preparing to shoot concrete in the park’s renovated swimming pool. One park worker noted the contrast.

"It’s like yin and yang," he said, referring to the Chinese philosophy concerning opposite forces in nature. "When the swimming pool collapsed, we had all these people and no pool. Now we’re seeing the yang: a pool and no people."

While Cove Lake and Norris Dam closings will inconvenience many out-of-town visitors, the loss of Indian Mountain will be a tremendous loss to the local community.

"Indian Mountain is the only thing that this area has at all," said Cummins. "You’re pretty much taking a large chunk of the community out of service."

Jellico Mayor John Clifton agreed. "The closing of Indian Mountain State Park, even if it turns out to be only temporary, is both unthinkable and totally unacceptable," he said. "It is a very small park in our area where few other state services are provided and it is so very, very valuable to us.

"We have all heard the expression, ‘like throwing a penny into the ocean,’" Clifton continued. "Closing our local state park is like throwing a penny back out of the ocean in order to lower the water level. Closing our park is false economy."

Cummins said the park, which was opened in 1972 as a demonstration project by reclaiming a strip mine, only has four employees, and he is the only uniformed officer, so on the two days the park is closed he will still be working, turning people away.

Perhaps Talley said it best when describing the shock park officials are facing.

"This has happened so quickly, and nothing like this has ever happened before," he said. "It’s not like a business, where you just close up shop and give the key to the landlord. The people are the landlord.

"Who do you give the keys to?"