Moving up my $#**-list: Lightning and Park Rangers
Disclaimer: Normally the hallowed pages of this blog are reserved for high-brow discussion of issues facing society as a whole.
Today, I’m ticked off and just feel like ranting.
With that in mind, proceed with caution. I’ll try and throw in a thought-provoking question or two into the mix, but no guarantees. I have a funny feeling when this is done, I won’t have something worthy of posting to The Shovel (in retrospect, I did it anyway).
Some of our loyal readers have noticed a decline in my posts, of late. Some have even dropped notes of concern, checking to see if I was alive. Well, I assure you, I am alive indeed, despite several close calls at the Sturgis Rally this week. Locals may have heard about the lightning strike at Glencoe CampResort. According to the known laws of physics and logic, electricity follows the path of least resistance. To me, it would seem that the “big geeky-lookin’ kid” (as Napoli calls me) working gate security on a hillside underneath a thirty-foot light pole surrounded by the cast iron gates which were my charge (pun intended) would be the most likely candidate for a strike. Anyway, since the folks made it, only slightly worse for the wear, I can look back, laugh nervously, and thank the Good Lord that it wasn’t me this time.
So enough about me. Let’s talk about something which really bothers… well… me, but I’m sure it bothers others as well: Park Rangers. More specifically, Park Rangers with law enforcement powers.
As if this post doesn’t have enough disclaimers, let me clarify that this rant doesn’t apply to real regular cops, so don’t start in on how I’m attacking the servers and protectors. They’re cool with me. In fact, they get a gold star from me (whatever that’s worth) this week after showing up within three minutes and busting a drunk driver I called in. No, this is about the police academy dropouts men and women who have found themselves working extensively trained to work for the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management or U.S. Forest Service who now carry firearms and a scorching superiority complex. I’ll leave out GF&P, so I can collectively call them “feds”.
Living near the base of Mount Rushmore National Memorial, I’ve witnessed countless vacations ruined by a lapse of 5 m.p.h. followed by lights and sirens followed by a $100 ticket (apparently the feds like round numbers). It’s a vicious pattern:
1. Mount Rushmore is a majestic spectacle.
2. People want to look at it.
3. Many people don’t have the time to enter the facility, or the desire to pay for the $10 parking permit.
4. The feds don’t like the idea of people not paying the $10, so they put up barricades to block roadway parking (supposedly for safety, right?).
5. The barricades lead to the dangerous combination of turned heads while driving into oncoming traffic and, of course, speeding.
6. Speeding leads to $100 tickets.
7. Tickets lead to angry tourists.
8. Angry tourists lead to fewer tourists next year. Bad news travels fast.
And now we come to this week. Good old Sturgis Rally. Everybody in the Hills makes some extra money this week, whether they want to admit it or not. Well, apparently Fort Meade is no different. On my way to Glencoe each day, I took the cutoff road between I-90 and Hwy 34, bypassing the half million bikes in Sturgis. The first day, as I drove down the road, I noticed a ranger parked on the side of the road with his radar gun pointed at me.
“Good,” I thought. “Get some of those hotshots who take this 25 m.p.h. road at 50.”
And so I waved, and went about my merry way. Even when I noticed the ranger’s comrade having pulled someone over about 200 yards past the first guy, I thought it was quite alright.
However, when I saw the same thing in the same place on the next day (and not surprisingly, the third day as well), I figured out what was going on. It was an organized shakedown! Two or three rangers would sit there, all day and all night, and give tickets. They would trade off radaring and pulling over, radaring and pulling over, radaring and pulling over.
Now, I’m a man of logic and statistics, and I do not buy that there just so happened to be that many hotshot speeders all three days in the same exact place at the same exact time. Especially when the cars that were pulled over were mostly Buicks and minivans. Hence my use of the word “shakedown.”
Oops, I’m at the end of my post and still haven’t asked a thought-provoking question. OK, here’s one for ya to ponder: Many vendors in the Black Hills raise their prices during the Rally, and therefore make killer profits off of a two-week stretch. Is it acceptable for the U.S. Government to essentially do the same thing? And to readers in Sturgis, can you verify if those rangers are there year-round? Because I seriously doubt it.
August 8th, 2008 at 11:13 am
Oh yes, and I forgot one of my main points, which was to thank my fellow Wingnut blogger, Guy Smylie, for his good work in holding down the fort while I was away. Thanks, Guy!
August 8th, 2008 at 12:19 pm
Yup!
And with your post, that’s why I like visiting the hills in September. Because everything is all wound up from June to August.
August 9th, 2008 at 11:11 am
It’s a danged shame you have no idea what you are talking about. National Park Rangers, BLM Rangers and US Forest Service and Fish and Wildlife Service Law Enforcement Officers are NOT “police academy dropouts”. They go through a highly competitive selection procedure, like any other police officer. They are required to have a four year degree in biological sciences or criminal justice, pass a written and oral examination, extensive background check, physical and psychological exams, and then attend a 12-week, 48 hours per week training academy at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Glyncoe, GA. (The same academy that all federal officers, except FBI agents, go to.) Then, if they make it that far and pass at FLETC, they spend a year with several Field Training Officers in different land management units across the country before being assigned to the unit where they will work. Even seasonal rangers have to have two years of college and attend a 6-week seasonal law enforcement training academy., and that is just to be able to work, under the supervision of regular enforcement rangers from Memorial Day to either Labor Day or Columbus Day, depending on the unit’s visitation patterns.
All federal LEOs, (”feds” as you call them) are commissioned law enforcement officers, with full police powers in all 50 states and US Territories. (In other words, “real cops”.) and are very often cross-certified by local and state agencies to enforce state laws, under what is known as “concurrent jurisdiction”. Even with the tough standards to get in, there is a waiting list to get “on the job”, particularly with the Park Service and the Forest Service. Many time, the recruits come from a law enforcement background with city, county or state agencies, but there is no reciprocity. If a deputy sheriff or state trooper is accepted as a federal LEO, her/she still has to go through all the hoops required of a new hire.
Add to that the fact that National Park Rangers are also required to serve and be certified as wildland and structural firefighters, emergency medical technicians, search and rescue/mountain rescue experts and teacher/interpreters and I would say that you get a heck of a deal for your tax dollar from the average park ranger.
Not quite what you seem to think.
August 9th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Fair enough. Thank you, A Park Ranger, for your well-thought-out and educational response. I apologize for using the term “police academy dropouts.” I was (and am still) upset by the situation and personalized it by using a derogatory term. That was wrong, and I’ll strike it out.
Now then, while I have you here, could you please respond to the rest of the post? Do you deny the shakedown process going on in our Parks? I’d like to hear an honest perspective from someone close to the perceived problem. Please give an honest opinion, remembering that your identity is safe, and hidden behind a screen name.
August 9th, 2008 at 5:41 pm
You raise a good question Gid, I believe that the ticket revenue from most tickets end up in the k-12 public schools, where does the “revenue” from the tickets written in the federal parks end up ?
August 10th, 2008 at 11:40 am
You can see by the park ranger’s response the arrogance that most all federal bureacrats, agents,or whatever have towards Joe Public. Since they are not beholden to any of us and only their federal bosses.
It’s an Us vs Them attitude. We are quite lucky that nobody got gunned down liked what happened at Ruby Ridge and Waco.
August 11th, 2008 at 9:30 am
Well, with Park Rangers response, it seems like they should have better things to do than write out moving violations.
I’d actually like those officers doing what they’re trained to do. Even if they have nothing to do at the time.
August 11th, 2008 at 6:23 pm
haha, ya, seems like alot of education just to run a speed trap for a week,,
August 11th, 2008 at 11:03 pm
Let’s go back a little, not too far back, though. Land management bureaucrats, in fact most bureaucrats, Federal or local, did not have law enforcement authority until very recently. Law enforcement authority rests with your county sheriff. If a law was violated on government land, the land management agent would contact the local sheriff for law enforcement assistance. Just like you would do if someone violated the law on your property.
But all bureaucrats want to be cops. So they agitate to get the power. Weak or ignorant elected officials, not wanting to rock the boat and jeopardize the flow of federal funds to their districts capitulate to the whims of the bureaucracy.
We end up with the situation we have today. Environmental extremists and other “get a Government Job” types have swelled the ranks of these agencies and now our elected ones have given them law enforcement authority. This should be extremely alarming to every citizen, but only seems to be of concern to some…..Conservatives.
August 12th, 2008 at 7:20 am
That’s where the Second Amendment comes in.
August 23rd, 2008 at 7:13 pm
The Rushmore law enforcement rangers are out of control. They are bored, they only have like 5 miles of road to patrol, one road no less (244). I’ve seen them pick people up within the city limits of Keystone, and if you drive out there in the evening (not during tourist season) around, say, 10 pm, you’ll have a 95% chance of finding one parked at the intersection of 16A and 244 just lurking out of sight for some poor slob who didn’t ride his breaks all the way down the hill and gravity pulled him up just over the 35mph speed limit.
These guys are gung-ho. I’ve seen them pat down hunters and make people empty their cars. They’re that bored. Gerard Baker needs to get control of this before these rangers hurt somebody.