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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Oct 22, 2013 - 05:09pm PT
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I've learned that stupid dooshtards are still sitting in Congress.
Burned by fire and shutdown
by Peter Hecht
phecht@sacbee.com
Tourist towns suffer big losses in visitors, cash
GROVELAND---Starting Aug. 7, a force of nature devastated the economy of this
historic Tuolumne County town, 3,800 feet high on the mountain pass into Yosemite
National Park.
The Rim fire burned well into October, devouring more than a quarter-million acres
of forest. It’s choking smoke and gloom smothered business at Groveland’s Iron Door
Saloon, built in 1853, and frightened off Yosemite-bound tourists at the charming
Groveland Hotel.
Now this town of 600 residents is left to ponder what was worse: the force of nature that
scorched the forests or the force of politics that shuttered the federal government and
closed down Yosemite.
The tourist economy of Yosemite NP provides critical life support for nearby counties,
including Tuolumne, Mariposa, Merced and Madera. And while the park reopened
Thursday after a 16-day federal shutdown, the regional fall-out may be long-lasting.
In Groveland, economic heartbreak is counted in decidedly smaller numbers---and felt
in deeply personal ways.
For Pamela Harris, 45, soon-to-be former owner of the Pine Mountain Deli sandwich
and ice cream emporium, her heartbreak figure was $15,000. That’s what Harris took
out in a loan four years ago to buy the business where she worked.
Harris started struggling to make her payments when the Rim fire erupted. Yosemite was
open but the ferocious, billowing blaze stopped the traffic on Highway 120 that supported
the Pine Mountain Deli. She had a glimmer of hope when the fire died down, the roads
reopened and people started passing through again on their way to Yosemite. But the
Oct. 1 federal government closure brought Harris a financial death knell.
“Just when I thought I was going to be OK, they shut down the park,” Harris said.
Last week, when the government closure ended, when busloads of foreign tourists resumed
their stops in Groveland on pilgrimages to America’s natural treasure, Harris stood outside
her deli, with its “Going Out of Business Sale” sign, and sobbed. She has sold off her
sandwich counter and ice cream display and will close at the end of the month.
“I can’t blame the fact that we had a huge fire,” Harris said. “But I blame the government.
It’s because they don’t listen. They don’t care about me. This was irresponsible and
stupid and sad and disgusting.”
At the Iron Door Saloon, which claims to be the oldest bar in California, the developments
were confounding to owner Chris Loh.
For weeks, Loh says, Groveland has resembled “a ghost town.” As the fire fallout morphed
into the federal fallout, Loh let go 40 of 49 people who worked for him at businesses,
including his saloon and restaurant and his Iron Door General Store, the town’s main market.
Many of those workers have since had to apply for food stamps or other government
assistance, Loh said.
As the battles in Washington rolled with vitriolic exchanges over the nation’s new health care
law and the federal debt ceiling, Loh saw politicians and big-business lobbyists seemed
oblivious to the troubles of a small town just outside Yosemite.
“They’re fighting over their money, and we’re the ones suffering,” he said. “You can’t reach
that point without sacrificing some basic morals.”
Millions in lost spending
At the Groveland Hotel, owner Peggy Mosley has long delighted in serving prize-winning
Tuolumne County wines and staging dinner shows from live jazz to Elvis impersonators.
But even as Yosemite reopened, Mosley was finishing some painful bookkeeping, tallying
losses from a period in which she dramatically slashed hours for her 35 employees and let
a handful go.
Mosley, a board member of the American Lodging Association who lobbies on Yosemite
tourism issues, has been a supporter of Rep. Tom McClintock, the Republican congressman
who represents the area. But during the budget impasse, McClintock was a staunch defender
of efforts to withhold funding for the government to force changes in, or repeal of, the
federal health care law.
McClintock called Mosley during the shutdown to ask how she was faring. Mosley, who
suggests she is no great fan of the Affordable Care Act, gave her congressman an earful over
a political tactic that extended the misery of a region already scorched by fire.
“I told him, ‘Let Obama-care fall on its own,’” Mosley said. “’If it’s that bad, it will crash
and burn. But let’s reopen the park.’”
During the impasse, McClintock blamed Democrats for being unwilling to negotiate. Even
though he voted against the deal to end the shutdown, the congressman said in a press release Wednesday that “it relieves the immediate economic damage...that has fallen particularly hard
on the gateway communities surrounding our national forests and parks.”
In Tuolumne County, administrator Craig Pedro said the county of 45,000 residents will be
out at least $350,000 in hotel and sales taxes, a ripple effect from the estimated $3,250,000
in lost tourist spending during the Rim fire and Yosemite closure.
“My gut tells me that (estimate) is low,” said Pedro, who said it may take months to assess
the fallout.
Mosely, a board member for the Tuolumne County Visitors Bureau, said local business will
“take a humonguous hit,” possibly as much as $15,000,000 in lost hotel and motel
tourism.
In neighboring Mariposa County, also dependent on the peak May-October Yosemite
tourism season, administrator Richard Benson estimated the county lost more than
$3,500,000 in lodging revenues during the federal shutdown.
Still not business as usual
Even with the park open, Groveland and other towns around Yosemite remained largely
empty because tourists had canceled bookings en mass and made other travel plans.
In the town of Mariposa, the Mariposa Lodge, which normally fills all 45 rooms this time
of year, had four bookings. The Yosemite Way Station motel had booked eleven of its
seventy-nine rooms. At the Mariposa Hotel Inn, all six rooms were empty.
Owner Mary Poster fears she may have trouble filling them for a while
“It’s not back to business as usual,” she said. “It’s going to be a long, long time. We have
foreigners who booked months in advance and then canceled. They’ve made other plans.
They’re going to Tahoe. They’re going to Monterey.”
YNP Assistant Superintendent Scott Gediman said the 660 park employees who were
furloughed are back at work and campgrounds and trails have reopened in time for visitors
to savor the changing fall colors in the majestic setting
[and for Plaidman to try the Zodiac, finally, if he can make it back here and isn’t too disgruntled--how did that plan all turn out---an abort?].
While the federal employees will be reimbursed for lost wages, employees in the private
sector won’t be. So Mark Deger, 42, a service waiter at Yosemite’s regal Ahwahnee Hotel,
lost two weeks’ pay. So did his wife, chef Laura LeMessurier.
Deger, who was put out of work by the last federal shutdown in 1995, found himself cursing
in disbelief that it could happen again. “I’m happy to be back at work, but I’m very
pissed off,” he said.
Stopping to photograph the spectacular view from Yosemite’s Half Dome overlook, Dutch
tourists Stefan and Paula Essing were strangely bewildered by it all. They had waited at a
Mariposa hotel, hoping they might visit the world-renowned park before their vacation was
over. The stalemate in Washington ended just in time.
“It’s stupid,” Stefan Essing said. “The people of America are the losers in this—and so are
the tourists.”
In Groveland, Pamela Harris said she seethed with grief during a recent visit from a
representative for the US Small Business Administration who met with merchants affected
by the Rim fire and passed out business cards to those who might want disaster loans.
By then, Yosemite was a victim of the federal shutdown, and her business was finished.
“The government has done enough for me,” she said she told the representative, brusquely handing the business card back.
“Thank you very much.”
Call the Bee’s Peter Hecht, (916) 326-5539.
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Nemesis
climber
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Oct 22, 2013 - 06:55pm PT
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It wasn't the Republicans who barricaded the parks and monuments. That directive was implemented by the administration.
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Jaybro
Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
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Oct 22, 2013 - 07:27pm PT
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Locker, that Partrifish family photo amalgam is funny as shit!
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Mark Hudon
Trad climber
Hood River, OR
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Oct 23, 2013 - 12:06pm PT
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Oct 22, 2013 - 06:25pm PT
It wasn't the Republicans who barricaded the parks and monuments. That directive was implemented by the administration.
That's not true. What stays open was decided long before the Republicans caused the shutdown.
With searching on the internet being so easy, you would think that people might want to spend a little time on it before making fools of themselves posting things that simply are not true.
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WBraun
climber
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Oct 23, 2013 - 12:11pm PT
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And those loans to help small businesses? Farms are excluded.
Does this even make any sense at all?
Food is a root necessity.
Without food no business can even exist.
Humanity can't exist without food.
So no loans for the farmer but loans for everything else that needs food to even exist.
Is the world stupid and operating backwards .......????
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Ward Trotter
Trad climber
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Oct 23, 2013 - 01:02pm PT
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1.People have been made to become overly dependent upon politicians and bureaucrats in Washington. This is by design . (Even ducks can be made to grovel for the bits the politicians throw)
2. Many of the programs and agencies that people have been made overly dependent upon are not altruistic projects ---but are nothing but justifications for cash and power grabs by a Washington establishment that continues to borrow and print money that the nation does not have.
3. The current Federal Government does not have the broad interests of the American people in mind. Today it is run and supported by too many who see it as a benevolent god that exists to further their crusades in life, and/or to fill their back pockets at the expense of their fellow citizens.
4. The politicians and bureaucrats are the problem not the solution. The spectacle of the shutdown helped to drive that point home for the American people,especially the hard working taxpayers, who are increasingly convinced their interests are not being represented.
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