Ravenwood - 08/16/05 06:30 AM
Gun control is having expected results in our National Parks. Attacks are on the rise, and not even the park police and park rangers are immune.
More than 280 million people are expected to visit a national park by the end of this summer. But as attendance to these parks continue to rise, so do attacks on the parks' rangers and officers...According to PEER, law enforcement work in the National Park Service is the most dangerous in federal service. PEER numbers show that National Park Service officers are 12 times more likely to be killed or injured as a result of an assault than FBI agents.
Across the country, nearly half of these incidents took place in areas under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Park Police on the National Mall, the Statute of Liberty, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Camp David perimeter, dozens of D.C. area parks and five parkways.
Note how the most dangerous parks for the Rangers (as well as everyone else) are urban areas. What the F#$% do they expect when they assign specialists in policing uninhabited areas to patrol places like the National Mall?
Posted by: markm at August 16, 2005 12:34 PM280 million? that's the entire population of the United States, I'm not planning on going to a National Park at all this year.
Posted by: John at August 16, 2005 12:56 PMI think that statistic means 280 million visits. Sounds pretty reasonable, as some people keep coming back.
Posted by: markm at August 17, 2005 1:01 PMEspecially with their loose definition of national park. I wonder if they're including commuters driving along the GW Parkway.
Posted by: Ravenwood at August 17, 2005 1:43 PM"when they assign specialists in policing uninhabited areas to patrol places like the National Mall"
Don't confuse the U.S. Park Police with the NPS's rangers. They're a regular urban police force.
The other trick to this whole thing is that National Park Service Law Enforcement Rangers are vastly more likely to be in contact with the general public than most federal officers, (Border Patrol, Customs, and INS being the obvious exceptions). Who is going to have 1500 public contacts a day? A park ranger in mid-summer, or an FBI or ATF agent?
Posted by: Dan at October 17, 2005 4:52 PM(c) Ravenwood and Associates, 1990 - 2014
