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Date: January 23, 2008

Symposium designed to address user capacity issues in national parks and other public lands, including implications for Yosemite National Park's future park planning efforts

The National Park Service invites the public to a User Capacity Symposium in Yosemite National Park to be held at Yosemite Lodge in Yosemite Valley from February 6-8, 2007.

The purpose of the User Capacity Symposium is to further the understanding of and explore approaches to addressing user capacity in national parks and other public lands by engaging public land managers, researchers, elected officials, tribes, and the general public in an open dialogue. User capacity is the types, locations, and extent of visitor and other public use in the parks.

Addressing visitor use in national parks as vast and complex as Yosemite requires a variety of methods and perspectives. During the symposium, the public will have the opportunity to understand further why planning and managing user capacity is important, to build a common understanding of and language for user capacity, and to identify and understand the effectiveness and consequences of different management strategies.

The User Capacity Symposium will consist of two days of meetings facilitated by Mary Orton, an outside environmental and public policy mediator, and an optional Yosemite Valley field trip guided by park planners. The schedule will be as follows:

DAY 1: Wednesday, February 6th, 9am to 5pm

DAY 2: Thursday, February 7th, 9am to 5pm

DAY 3: Friday, February 8th, 9am to 12pm

Please respond to Jim Bacon, Park Planner, at 209/379-1067 if you plan to attend or for more information. Reservations should be made as soon as possible, and no later than February 1, 2007. Information is also available at www.nps.gov/yose/parkmgmt/symposium.htm.

Park entrance fees will be waived for symposium participants.