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Piqued by park time cutbacks
From Lloyd Neck to Wading River, service reductions, fee hikes irk LIers
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Now that the days are getting longer and the evenings warmer, one Huntington couple had hoped to take advantage of the bucolic paths and trails of the 1,600-acre Caumsett State Park in Lloyd Neck.
Living on a busy and hilly road and six months pregnant, Beth Thomas said she feels safer walking or running inside the park with her husband, Sean, after he returns from work.
But recently the hours of operation at Caumsett and other state parks have been curtailed, a change that has rubbed many residents the wrong way.
Thomas said that the reduced hours are especially egregious because so many people first arrive at the park after 5 pm. "It just doesn't make any sense," she said. "It's particularly an insult when you have someone at the guardhouse, sitting there turning people away. And they're actually turning people away before 5 o'clock."
Effective April 2009 through April 2010, Caumsett hours have been shortened three hours per weekday evening, from 8 pm to 5 pm. On Saturdays and Sundays, hours remain the same: from dawn to dusk.
Ron Foley, the New York State Parks regional director, said his department is acutely aware of people using the park after 5 pm.
"That's why we didn't change the hours on the weekends," he said. "On weekends, it's operating full day, when most people come with their families."
Every agency in the state was asked to reduce its budget to shore up the deficit, Foley explained. State parks cut $5 million, meaning that there is $1.5 million less money available for state parks on Long Island.
"We reduced budgets to all the 28 parks in the region as much as we could without impacting the public and we still had about $700,000 to go," he said. "And we had to start picking out things that we could stop doing that would impact the smallest number of people."
Before the cuts, there were three people working from 5 to 8 pm on weekdays at Caumsett to watch over the public's safety and clean restrooms, Foley said. Now there is one person there during from 5 to 8 pm.
"We've cut it back to one shift per day on the weekdays, essentially," he said.
In Smithtown, the 543-acre Caleb Smith State Park is now closed on two weekdays instead of just one.
"It was closed on Mondays," said Foley. "Now it's closed on Mondays and Tuesdays."
Caleb's park manager, Clarence Ware, said he has not yet heard any complaints from the hiking public about the reduced days. "But the fisherman are not happy at all," he said. Aside from the Tuesday closing, the 4 to 8 pm fishing session on Thursdays through Sundays (and holidays) was also cut, Ware said.
Though budgets were reduced at Wildwood State Park in Wading River and both Nissequogue River and Sunken Meadow parks in Smithtown, those sites were able to keep their normal dawn-to-dusk schedules.
To lower the regional parks budget by $1.5 million, Foley's office not only cut spending but also increased revenue by raising fees for special services, though not general entrance fees.
"So if you look across the entire region, it costs more to play golf than last year," he said. "It costs more for the annual pass to get into parks than it did last year, although the park entrance fee is the same."
Two forms of revenue for Caumsett park are the Lloyd Harbor Equestrian Center horse stables, which will has brought in $178,300 since last July, said John Kowalchyk, deputy director of the state park's department's Long Island region.
The park also is slated to earn an additional $15,000 from rental fees for shooting scenes of "Fair Game," a feature film starring Sean Penn and Naomi Watts that just completed shooting there.
Foley said his office will respond to people's complaints, which have focused mainly on the closing of West End 2 at Jones Beach and on the reduced hours at Caumsett.
"It makes us look at it and try to rethink it and figure out something else," he said. "In the case of Jones Beach, I don't think we have any choices. Caumsett, we need to sit down and talk about that and see if we could come up with something that works better."
Petitions would not hold much sway, he surmised.
"Petitions are a lot of work for the same amount of impact somebody would get by giving us a thoughtful argument. … We can't change the money. We still have to somehow absorb the same amount of budget reduction that we did before we had this conversation. But if there's a different way we can do it, we'll try to do that," Foley said.
One thing the state Parks office won't do is increase admission fees, which are established on a statewide basis. "Everybody decided early on in this discussion that we didn't want to increase the fee, because with the economy going the way it is, we need to keep going to parks affordable," he said.
Mindful of the inconvenience that fewer hours are causing to hikers, cyclists and fishermen, Foley said, "We're in the process of looking at everything again, as we always do."
Reverting to dawn-to-dusk weekday hours would suit Thomas very well.
"I'd be overjoyed," she said. "Please, please reinstate the hours."
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