Paul Hoffman Speech Transcript

Speaker: Paul Hoffman, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Fish, Wildlife and Parks

Steve Martin (Director of the Intermountain Region of the National Park Service): I would to introduce Paul Hoffman who is not a stranger to a lot of people here. He spent a lot of time in Cody, but he worked as a wilderness guide, as a state director for former Congressman Dick Cheney, executive director of the Cody Chamber of Commerce and is currently the Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Fish, Wildlife and Parks. It's a real honor to have one of our own who's now a leader in parks and conservation within the national system to come and help us in this dedication.

[Applause]

Paul Hoffman: Well thank you very much Steve, Suzanne for a great introduction. The trouble with being a keynote speaker I think is that everything has been said, but not everybody has said it yet, so bear with me folks.

[Laughter]

I do want to thank some other people who I am not sure have been thanked yet, and that's the people who have put together all of the events that associated with heritage days here, today, tomorrow and through the weekend. I hope you all get a chance to partake in that. And I want to give thanks to all of you who have showed up today to help celebrate this centennial of the Old Faithful Inn. It's extremely gratifying to see this great turnout, and know that the old principle of the mind can't absorb what the feet and seat can't endure, I will try to keep it short here.

[Laughter]

I would also like to thanks some of our partners who help us in running our national parks system, nit the least of which is Xanterra Parks and Resorts.

[Applause]

In fact, I think it was Mark Twain who said: "All saints can do miracles, but few can keep a hotel."

[Laughter]

And I think keeping a hotel in Yellowstone National Park puts them one notch above most of the average saints.

[Laughter, Applause]

But the concession partnership is a unique partnership. It's one that really helps keep the parks going. We are proud of our 20,000 odd National Park Service staff people who conserve these wonderful natural and cultural resources, and to keep them open for you folks to come enjoy them. But there are also about 10,000 concession employees, and for the average visitor to a national park the chance of them encountering a ranger is just about as equal with them encountering a concession employee. And so I believe when brag about our 90 percent satisfaction rating for visitors to national parks, a lot of that we can contribute to the good work of the concession operators and their employees.

[Applause]

And being the executive director of the Cody Chamber of Commerce for 12 years, I can't go on without saying that it's important that we acknowledge our gateway community partners. They serve as hosts to the visitors of our national parks, they help prepare visitors for the experiences they are about to have in our national parks, they share in the enjoyment of these parks as well as the protection of these resources, and they benefit from them. And that's a good thing; it's an appropriate combination of symbiotic relationships, if you will, of enjoying and conserving at the same time, and keeping it all protected for future generations.

And lastly, I'd like to thank our funding partners, the Yellowstone (Park) Foundation, and our interpretative partners, the Yellowstone Association, for the good work they do to help you, the visitors, enjoy your stay here at Yellowstone.

[Applause]

And lastly, I'd like to make a special thank you to the National Park Service. From the rangers to the clerical help, from the architects to the maintenance crew, from the superintendent to the seasonal employee, they are the keepers of the trust. They're the ones w ho have preserved the Old Faithful Inn, brought it down through the last 88 of its 100 years in the great condition that we see it here today. They are responsible for conserving the natural and cultural resources and for providing for the enjoyment of the same in such a manner as to keep them unimpaired for future generations. Between the U.S. Army, which first protected our parks, and the National Park Service, the Old Faithful Inn stands here today as a testimony to their efforts to conserve these resources. And I hope all of you join me in saluting the National Park Service.

[Applause]

But we are really here to give thanks to the Old Faithful Inn. This special place means so much to so many of us. It is where cultural preservation and natural resource preservation meet. There are those who will say the European history of the West is short, but I would say it is a rich history, and much of it is embodied right here in the Old Faithful Inn. Robert Reamer had a vision. This 29-year-old architect saw more than another Queen Anne hotel. He recognized that the Inn should reflect its surroundings. He recognized the principle that asymmetry is part of nature, that there is beauty in the form of nature, but that it is not always perfectly symmetrical, and as you look around notice that the windows are not all balanced. In total it balances wonderfully, but there is an extra gable here, an extra window there.

Robert Reamer had that vision for how asymmetry came together for the beauty of the whole. And Robert Reamer is really the beginning, the father of a new genre of architecture that we now call Parkitecture. And the builders, let's think back to a 100 years ago when the builders erected this, the largest log structure in the world, in one winter in Yellowstone Park. They say you can't plan this rarified level of success, you can only be grateful when it happens. I wonder if the workman new the magnitude of their impact, and what it would mean to us a 100 years later. Could Reamer have really known just how loved this grand hotel would become? The Old Faithful Inn is the symbol of the romance between America and its parks. The Inn is inextricably linked and woven into the fabric of our culture. Just listen to the stories here today: "I worked here in the summer of…" "I vacationed here with my family back when…" "I met my spouse here." Lord only knows how many babies were conceived here.

[Laughter]

"I proposed right over there." "I was married here." And in my own personal case, I spent my honeymoon here 25 years ago this week.

[Applause]

Each of us comes here today with our own unique national park experience. The Old Faithful has become apart of the very fabric of our individual lives as well as our identity with our nation. It is not enough to remember the stories of the past, however, those are all very well, but we have to show a little tender loving care for this great institution. President Bush is committed to care for our national parks, partly by addressing the maintenance back log that (applause) … has resulted from decades of benign neglect. No one really intended for things to get behind, but they have. And President Bush is committed and has met his commitment to address the maintenance back log as articulated in 1997. But in order for future Americans to carry away their memories of the Old Faithful Inn, we must provide the care and loving that this facility needs to serve us for the next 100 years.

It's my pleasure today, on the 100th anniversary of the Old faithful Inn, to announce the administration's plans for the major renovation of this inn as part of President Bush's national Parks Legacy Project. The planning for this began in the spring of 2001. It is the most significant project of its kind for any structure inside a national park. It represents a team effort, which is how we get things done in today's world. The National Park Service with its project leader Peter Galindo, who couldn't be with us here today but our prayers are with him as he battles cancer, with our partners the concession operators, Xanterra parks and Resorts, the private architects and engineers, Jim McDonald is up here I see, A and E Architects of Missoula, and the Wyoming State Historic Preservation Office. This is the team that will oversee the project over the coming three years. As much as the visual things you will notice at the end of the three-year project, we will be meeting seismic standards for a building t hat sits in one of the most seismically active areas in the world. Sounds like a good idea to me. And we will be strengthening the superstructure and bringing it up to safety and fire codes while respecting and preserving the historic integrity and unique character of the Inn. Yes, there are costs with this-significant costs. Not the least of which will be the cost that you, the visitors, will have to endure and that will be a delayed opening of the Inn, for two of the next three years. The Inn will not likely open until sometime around the first of July. This is a cost to the visitor which I think will pay dividends over the next 100 years, but it is also a tremendous financial cost to the concession operators who forgo their chance at revenues, and we appreciate their willingness to see this project forward to its conclusion. The financial costs of two of the three phases have already been funded by Congress, and the first phase is $4,999,000, phase two in year two will be $8,305,000. As I said, the first two phases have already been funded Congress as part of the line item construction account, and that helps protect some of Yellowstone's operational costs, but they will still have to provide support and planning oversight and administration of the contract as well. Then phase three will be $9,059,000 and President Bush is committed to working with Congress to get that funded before we actually get to year three so we can complete the project on time.

With the design and the construction and administrative costs, the total project will be just over $30,000,000. It's a substantial investment, but I can think of no building that is more with the investment.

[Applause]

We in the administration are proud to participate in this historic project. I am proud to be here today to help celebrate the 100th anniversary of Yellowstone's Old Faithful Inn, and I hope you can be proud of this project as you a re equally proud of this Inn. And on behalf of Secretary Norton, who wishes she could be here in person but was unable to make the travel out, I thank you all for coming out to share this special day in this special place. Thank you very much.

[Applause]