Q&A: Bill Dickinson, Lake Mead National Recreation Area superintendent

By Richard N. Velotta

Friday, May 21, 2010 | 3 a.m.

The 1.5-million-acre Lake Mead National Recreation Area, home to the nation’s largest man-made lake, is gearing for another busy summer.

Supervising operations at the fifth-most-visited National Park Service attraction is Bill Dickinson, who became the park’s 12th superintendent Dec. 12, 2000.

Dickinson’s 36-year National Park Service career included stops at Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area in Tennessee and Kentucky, the USS Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and Grand Canyon National Park.

He served as assistant superintendent at Lake Mead, which gets 8 million visitors a year, beginning in 1994.

Dickinson talked with In Business Las Vegas about the upcoming summer, the challenges of operating the park in the recession and during one of the worst droughts in history and the relationship the park has with the business community through its dozens of concessionaires.

IBLV: Lake Mead is an economic force unto itself. Describe its effect in terms of the number of people employed directly by the national recreation area.

Dickinson: You’ve got the employees who work for Lake Mead National Recreation Area and those numbers vary at any given time of the year, but there normally are between 250 and 300 federal employees. That covers both Lake Mead and Lake Mohave, which is part of the park. They cover nine different developed areas, so that may seem a little light operationally. Beyond that, there are a number of major concessionaires, each with its own staff. Among them are the Gripintog family, which has a 1,300-slip marina and a couple of restaurants and they have a sizable workforce. We also issue what are called commercial use authorizations for people who have their primary place of business outside the park, but come into the park to do business, such as fishing guides for example. There are about 120 of those and each one has a fair number of employees. So overall, there are a lot of folks directly employed as a result of the recreation and tourism opportunities associated with Lake Mead. People often fail to recognize the expanded impact. We estimate that Lake Mead generates around $500 million to the regional economy.

What’s the effect regarding the number of people employed by concessionaires providing services including motels, float trips, retail stores, boat, watercraft and houseboat rentals, boat fuel, cafes, RV facilities, etc.?

I don’t have an exact number, but it’s fairly substantial, more than the number of employees that work directly for the Park Service. I mentioned the Gripintog family. Betty Gripintog, the matriarch of the family, has been here more than 50 years. They started out as a very small marina and now they have one of the largest marinas in the United States.

What’s the effect based on the number of visitors to Lake Mead annually?

We get about 8 million visitors a year. The $500 million economic benefit of those visitors to the lake and the surrounding region are direct expenditures here at the lake and indirect expenditures. We’re talking about the person driving up here with a huge vehicle pulling a boat or two boats or three boats, the gas that they have to spend to get to the park, the restaurants they stop and eat at, the groceries they buy when they go out on the lake. Many of those folks are actually staying at the lodges in the surrounding area and they spend the evening at shows or gambling. They’ve bought all their equipment for fishing, boating, diving and skiing. So there are several industries that are at least in part supported by Lake Mead. We draw from Southern California, Arizona and Utah. From the Southwest, we’re within a half day to a day’s drive for 30 million people. We’re also here for the 40-plus million people who are specifically coming to Las Vegas — not all of them will come to Lake Mead, of course, but many do. Right in the center of Lake Mead National Recreation Area is Hoover Dam, which is run by the Bureau of Reclamation, and that’s a major tourism attraction as well.

The Park Service also oversees the river below Hoover Dam and Lake Mohave. How much does that area affect your day-to-day operations and how far downstream is your jurisdiction?

The park goes all the way down to Laughlin, below Davis Dam. The bridge that crosses the river on the north end of Laughlin is essentially the park’s southern boundary. So we run south from Laughlin all the way to the north near Overton and the Moapa area. If you go to the east to the Grand Canyon, we go from an elevation of about 500 feet in the Lower Basins to more than 7,000 feet on the Shivwits Plateau, so there’s an incredible diversity of natural, cultural and geologic resources in the park. When people think of Lake Mead, they remember the water. It’s true that we are a large inland water recreation area, the largest man-made reservoir in the U.S. and one of the most visited national parks in the country. We were the first national recreation area in the park system. I think it’s interesting, being right outside Las Vegas, that people come to the city and from here go to the Grand Canyon, Death Valley and Zion (national parks). We’re another one of those units, and we actually receive twice the visitation of Grand Canyon. So we are a major destination and contributor to the overall economy.

What’s the visitor projection for Memorial Day versus last year? What was the peak year for visitation?

We annually receive somewhere around 200,000 visitors over the Memorial Day weekend. That single weekend visitation is more than the visitation in about 40 percent of the park system units over an entire year. It’s a heavy visitor load for most units of the National Park System. That’s spread between Lake Mead and Lake Mohave and the number of developed areas around the park. At any given time, we could have 5,000 boats out on the water, which is a fairly high density of boating activity.

What was the largest Memorial Day crowd you ever had?

(About) 240,000 visitors sticks in my head. In the past, we’ve had such heavy visitation that it was taking people 2 1/2 to three hours to launch boats. We’ve tried to address that by getting advanced information out and communicate to people as they’re coming where it’s easiest to get their boats on the water so they don’t have such a long wait. And some people are taking advantage that we have more marina slips now. If they have a boat in the marina, they don’t have to launch it. Some are coming in early and tying their boats at the marina to avoid the crowds. There’s a cost associated with that, but for some, it’s worth it. They’ll come in for the night, go to dinner or a show and then get back on the water easily.

How has visitation to Lake Mead changed in recent years because of drought conditions and how has that affected revenue collected by the park and the concessionaires?

We have experienced impacts as a result of the dropping lake level, and it’s twofold. On one side, there are expenditures that have to be made to maintain access to the water and to continue to provide facilities. The Park Service estimates that we have to spend somewhere between $4 million to $6 million for every 20 feet the lake level drops. That’s extending ramps, moving courtesy docks and navigational aids, repositioning the water intakes that we have for our water treatment facilities. For every foot the lake level drops vertically, you can move 20 to 30 feet horizontally, depending on the gradient. With a 100-foot drop, you could be 3,000 feet away from where the shore line used to be. Also, these major destinations are like small cities. We have water, sewer, utilities and roads, parking and buildings. The difference for us is that when the lake level drops, we have to pick up the city and move it to respond to those changing conditions. So that’s pretty expensive.

It’s also expensive to our concessionaires because they have to move an entire marina operation. They have to extend their utilities. The frequency of those moves partially depends on the nature of the harbor they’re in, but lately they’ve had to move more frequently. The more routine moves can be accommodated by tightening or loosening a whole bunch of cables attached to anchors. But in large moves, they have to actually pick up and relocate all those anchors and place new anchors. We’re talking 80 to 100 2 1/2-ton blocks being relocated, so it’s a really extensive maneuver.

This year, we’re estimating that the marina operators will be spending a couple of million dollars in response to the dropping lake levels and that’s if they’re able to stay in their existing location. The Overton Beach Marina had to move from the Overton location 40 miles to Temple Bar and the Gripintog Marina used to be in the Las Vegas Basin. Now, it’s 14 miles uplake. That was done with all the boats sitting in the marina as they very slowly moved it to their new location.

The other problem with the lower lake level is the impact on visitation and we have seen some immediate blips as a result of particular actions and I’ll give you a specific example. A few years back, the Southern Nevada Water Authority ran an ad campaign to encourage water conservation. As part of the campaign, they showed a mud flat at Lake Mead with a boat sitting on the mud flat. It was a very effective campaign and the Park Service supports water conservation. But that particular photograph left some people thinking that Lake Mead was dry. As a result of that, people in Southern California and Arizona — people that weren’t right here and knew there was still a lot of water in the lake — were canceling trips. That had an immediate impact on our concessionaires. House boat rentals completely dropped off. People who were planning trips or were going to buy supplies at the marina canceled and the concessionaires were affected immediately. When we saw that occurring, we had a quick sit-down discussion with Pat Mulroy (Southern Nevada Water Authority general manager), and she agreed to pull that particular image and things bounced back up. So there was an obvious and immediate reaction due to that campaign.

If you extrapolate from that, you can see where people hear about the dropping lake levels, the low water and the conditions and they think, “Hmm, is this really a destination for me? Is there going to be enough water to enjoy recreational opportunities?” And some people have said, “No.” I don’t think they fully appreciate the size of Lake Mead. It is a very large lake. When it’s full, there’s about 180,000 acres of surface water with nearly 900 miles of shoreline. Even with the dropping lake levels, there are tremendous opportunities. Some people actually are viewing the lower lake level as an opportunity because they now have access to some places they hadn’t been before. So on that front, things are starting to come back.

How has the recession affected visitation and spending?

The economy obviously has had an impact, but we believe that a recreational experience at Lake Mead is a good value for the dollar. You can bring our entire family and have an on-the-water or on-the-land experience as a relatively inexpensive vacation. We try to emphasize the value. It’s also a great add-on value for people coming to Las Vegas. It’s a different experience to what you have on the Strip. There are people who aren’t interested in gambling who like to come to the lake. Even though the economy has hit the businesses at Lake Mead, we think we are beginning to experience some bounce-back. Obviously the price of gas has an impact, especially if you have a big motor on the lake. But people adjust. They don’t spend as much time at full throttle driving around the lake. They find a spot where they want to park their boat and don’t drive around as much.

Some of the facilities have closed. Are others closing or in danger of closing?

We’ve had some close because of the water level, not because of the economy. We did a low-water general management plan amendment to help position the park in a way that we could better respond to the changing lake-level conditions. As a part of that, we identified the locations where we could continue to operate marinas and continue to provide lake access as the water level dropped. We believe the existing locations will continue to accommodate additional drops in the lake level and we won’t be faced with the challenges we had early on. We won’t have any more Overton situations, where the location the marina was at is high and dry now. We feel pretty good about where things are now and don’t think we’ll be experiencing those kinds of impacts.

This is probably a good time to ask about the water management of the entire length of the Colorado River because it seems that Lake Powell is filling more rapidly than Lake Mead. What are some of the details of the basin’s water management plan?

I should first say that the Bureau of Reclamation manages the Colorado River system. The allocation system was developed many, many years ago. The Colorado River Compact lays out the allocation. The Lower Basin states were allocated 7.5 million acre-feet of water under that compact, then a few years later there was an allocation for Mexico. So in total, the Lower Basin states receive 8.23 million acre-feet of water out of Lake Powell on an annual basis. It’s not quite that simple — it’s actually a 10-year average and it can fluctuate, but generally, it’s 8.23 million acre-feet. The Lower Basin states are fully utilizing their allocations. Because of that, all the water that comes into Lake Mead goes out to meet those Lower Basin allocations. When you add that use and evaporation and inflow from side streams that are supposed to help us but that don’t come in, we end up experiencing a 10- to 14-foot drop in the lake level each year, even though we’re getting that water from Lake Powell. The first priority is the Lower Basin states. Because they have to send that, the negotiation between the Upper and Lower Basin states allows for an agreement that they’re going to try to store more water in Powell to meet those Lower Basin obligations. So Powell, in any given year, may get less than what they have to send to the lower end of the system, so they’re trying to regain that capacity so they can meet future obligations. So, as we sit here today, Powell is going up and Mead is going down, but when you look at how the system works, it’s understandable because if water doesn’t come in, they have to send it anyway so they could drop very rapidly to meet those obligations. There are certain (water) elevations set on Powell where they would send additional water to us above the 8.23 million acre-feet. Those are set in interim shortage guidelines. Unfortunately, in the last couple of years they haven’t hit those elevations. Three years ago, they did hit it, and we got a little extra water. That’s important to us to get that extra water because it helps us bounce back. We anticipate in the future the lake level will go up again, but we’ll see more frequent and dramatic fluctuations due to the allocation of the system and the full use of that allocation in the Lower Basin. And then, there’s always the question of climate change and what impacts that might have.

With the drought and the recession, it’s hard to imagine the concessionaires wanting to invest in their facilities. Is this a problem where the visitor experience may be jeopardized because of lack of investment in the park facilities?

Obviously, you always run that risk, but there are certain requirements as a part of their contracts relative to the maintenance of their facilities. They have to meet certain standards. There may be less motivation to make investments. Our vision at Lake Mead is to be the premier water recreation area in the West. One of the primary visitor facilities is our marina facilities, and our concessionaires recognize that. If they provide a quality facility and a quality experience to the visitor, those visitors are going to keep coming back and by word-of-mouth, they’re going to get more and more visitors. There’s somewhat of a false sense of economy not to make those investments to ensure that you have quality facilities on the lake. In the past, we’ve had some issues with that, but I think we’re fortunate right now that we have concessionaires who recognize the value and importance of making sound investments in those facilities and recognize there’s a return that’s ultimately realized on that investment. So I think we’re in pretty good shape.

What has been the trend with Congress in funding the national recreation area in recent years? Are you receiving adequate funding or is there a deficit that affects the visitor experience?

That’s a little challenging to answer. As an agency, the National Park Service has been more fortunate than a lot of other federal agencies over the last couple of years. Our budget has increased slightly as an agency. Lake Mead has received some small increases in funding. But those increases for us are not keeping up with the increased cost, so what we’re experiencing, like many businesses in the local community, is a budgetary erosion, and our buying power isn’t what it used to be. As a result of that, we’re not able to do as much with the money that has been appropriated by Congress. We have lost staffing, not because of cuts but because of budget erosion. We’re trying to find ways to offset that. In Southern Nevada, we’ve been hugely fortunate to have the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act — the sale of BLM lands. That funding source has made available resources for us to do capital improvements, to respond to the low water level and to do recreational enhancements that otherwise would not have been possible. Frankly, I’m not sure how we would have responded to the low water conditions. We’ve probably spent $35 million to $50 million over the last couple of years as the lake level has dropped, most of it from that funding. We’ve also used our entrance station funding to extend launch ramps and respond to lower water conditions. Without that, we would have been in a world of hurt.

What has been the reaction to proposed Lake Mead fee increases and why should park users pay for what is basically a natural disaster — a drought — given the immense resources of the federal government?

I think there’s some question about how immense the resources are of the government. Every day, you read about how we don’t have enough to cover the costs that are being incurred. At Lake Mead, other units of the National Park Service and other public lands offer tremendous values to the public, both in quality of life and economic advantages to the local communities. The large number of people coming to the park present new challenges in our ability to continue to provide quality services and facilities. Every taxpayer supports the Park System, but those people who actually visit, we believe, have an additional obligation to help support those facilities that are provided for their experience. We think the fees that are being charged and are proposed for Lake Mead are still a good value for the experience they have when they come here. A seven-day single-visit pass for $10 is not a huge expenditure for most people. It does impact a certain portion of the population. And we do offer fee-free days, so there are opportunities for people who can’t afford the fee to get out and enjoy the lake. And you can bring a carload of people for that fee. We believe it’s still a good value, and there is a legitimate reason and need for those fees and we think there’s a return on the fees that people pay because we are providing enhanced facilities.

We noticed some stimulus funding apparently was used for paving North Shore Road recently. Are there other special stimulus projects in the works?

We’ve done several stimulus projects. You mentioned paving North Shore Road. We did some chip-and-seal road work. We’re moving forward right now with awarding a contract for a photovoltaic system that will help us reduce our energy consumption. We have enhanced some of the fish cleaners and done some (abandoned) mine closures under the program.

We understand the Bureau of Reclamation operates Hoover Dam, but you must have some feel for the bypass bridge’s effect when it opens. How will that affect the concessionaires in the park and at the dam?

It ought to help the concessionaires and us. The bridge will make it easier for people to come to the Nevada side as well as to go from the Nevada side to the Arizona side to visit different parts of the park. As an example, the Willow Beach area (on the Arizona side, just below the dam) used to have more facilities down there than we have now. We’re redeveloping that area. It’s going to be a wonderful destination and it will be a lot easier to get to with the bridge. There also are enhancements on U.S. 93 from the park boundary to Hoover Dam, from two lanes to four lanes. People coming up from Kingman or Interstate 40 will be able to get to the park easier as well as all the way into Las Vegas. We think Lake Mead will be more attractive as a result of the bridge and the highway improvements. Hoover Dam itself might experience an initial drop in car traffic — and you’d have to go to the Bureau of Reclamation for hard figures — but we think they will continue to experience good visitation because the people who want to experience Hoover Dam will be able to continue to do that. The nature of the experience will probably be enhanced because there won’t be as much congestion from the pass-through traffic. The people who will be going there will be going to see the dam.

So you’re thinking there may be increased visitation as a result of the bridge.

It may take awhile for people to change habits, but we think we’ll see more people. We’ll come back a year from now and let you know how that all worked out. The bridge is close to being done. I think they’re looking at finishing the bridge in August or September and dedicating it in November or December. The U.S. 93 improvements are supposed to be completed around the same time and our Willow Beach development is supposed to be completed at around the same time. At the end of this year and as we move into next year, we’ll see some rather exciting and enhanced visitor numbers as a result of those improvements.

There’s some conflict between the needs of air tour operators flying people over the dam and to the Grand Canyon and the needs of people enjoying Lake Mead and wanting clear skies and quiet. Is there anything happening with this issue in favor of either side, or will the status quo be in place awhile? What position has the Park Service taken when air tour operators propose flying in the National Recreation Area airspace?

I worked at the Grand Canyon between 1983 and 1985 and I worked on air tour matters then so it’s been going on a long time. There was an amendment put into the National Park Service Air Tour Management Planning legislation by Sen. (Harry) Reid and Sen. (John) Ensign that exempted air traffic over Lake Mead traveling strictly for tours to the Grand Canyon. We had started the Lake Mead management planning process with the (Federal Aviation Administration) and the air tour industry. It has been put on hold pending completion of the Grand Canyon process because points of entry and the numbers over Grand Canyon have an influence over what’s happening at Lake Mead. We believe there are opportunities to improve the visitor experience at Lake Mead on the ground without having any impact over the number or experience of air tours over Lake Mead. We believe air tour customers will continue to experience Hoover Dam and be able to fly over Lake Mead to get to their points of entry to conduct tours over the Grand Canyon regardless of what ends up happening in the planning process at Lake Mead. We think there are opportunities to find mutually acceptable solutions to providing a higher quality experience for people at Lake Mead while not impacting them. If you think about it, the bulk of the traffic for air tours at Grand Canyon include flying over Hoover Dam and they head for their point of entry at the Grand Canyon. If we could establish transportation corridors so they could make that flight from Hoover Dam to the Grand Canyon, it wouldn’t limit their numbers and they’d still have their experience, but it might help provide an enhanced experience outside that transportation corridor. Lake Mead has about 185,000 acres of wilderness in Nevada right outside Las Vegas — some incredible backcountry opportunities for people and we think we can provide them a quality experience that’s not impacted by overflights, working cooperatively with the air tour industry. We think there are solutions that are in everybody’s best interests. Time will tell since it’s tabled until the Grand Canyon works through their process.

The proposed growth of the solar and wind energy industry may affect the park. What are the potential effects, and are there any concerns the Park Service has expressed?

As an agency, we support the development of renewable energy sources, whether they be solar, wind or hydro, for the future of the country. We also believe that in planning those alternative energy sources that there needs to be some consideration for the implications of the resources that are being developed. When you look at Southern Nevada, most recently the controversy has been over wet or dry solar development. You can develop solar using less water as opposed to more water when you’re in an area that doesn’t have a whole lot of water. We believe that it’s more important to look at dry solar in those areas. If people continue to push the wet solar, then there are other implications. What does it do to the ground water resources that are available? What are the impacts on the springs? What are the impacts on the native ecosystems affected as a result of impacts on the springs? Those are the kinds of concerns that are most prevalent in our minds. If you develop large solar or wind systems in certain areas, what are the implications on wildlife migration corridors? What are some of the implications going to be if we experience some of the things that are being suggested as a result of climate change? If entire eco-regions migrate as a result of climate change, what are the implications of that when you think about the development of large renewable energy systems? Will they block the opportunity of some of those systems to migrate? We think all those things need to be considered as a part of a planning process, not that it necessarily eliminates an opportunity to develop renewable energy systems, because we think they’re important.

Are you doing any reviews on the possible effect on the park of a new airport in the Ivanpah Valley, south of Las Vegas?

We are a part of the overall process. Actually, the Mojave National Preserve has the lead down in Ivanpah. Ivanpah is a little bit removed from Lake Mead, but has implications. Where is all the traffic going to come in from and where is it going to depart to, associated with that airport and what does that mean for the resources of Lake Mead? I’ll give you an example. At the southern end of the Lake Mead National Recreation Area near Laughlin, we have Spirit Mountain. It’s the point of origin for many of the tribes along the Colorado River. It’s highly significant to the Native Americans, it’s sacred and it was the first traditional cultural property to be designated in the state of Nevada. It’s not a great idea to have a lot of air traffic flying over Spirit Mountain, either approaching Ivanpah or taking off. Well, it can be avoided. It’s possible in the planning process to make sure that doesn’t happen. So we do believe it’s important for us to be a part of the planning process and we recognize the challenges being faced because a lot of the air space is designated for different purposes and there are limited corridors in which they can move. But there are opportunities through good dialogue and good communication in a reasonable approach to things to find ways to allow the airport to achieve its objectives and at the same time recognize the importance and the value of the park resources that are potentially affected by the decisions of the airport.

So where is your favorite place in the park?

Gosh, that is a tough one. It’s like when I’m asked where I’ve enjoyed working the most because I’ve been at Grand Canyon and in Hawaii at the USS Arizona Memorial and in the Southeast at a place called the Big South Fork National River and now Lake Mead. When you think about all the different units, they’re all special and unique in their own ways and I’ve loved every spot. In a similar way, there are lots of places in Lake Mead that are wonderful. Depending on who you’re experiencing them with and what time of year you’re experiencing them and what your experience is on any given day, they can become the most special area that you’ve ever visited until your next visit. I’m sometimes surprised that there are a lot of people who live in Southern Nevada that have not experienced Lake Mead. They may have heard about it, but they’ve never come out to enjoy it. That’s both in terms of the land resources and the water. Eighty-seven percent of the 1.5 million acres of Lake Mead is land — incredible geology, unbelievable plant and animal life. People need to come out and experience it. What a wonderful destination for folks. In fairness to the other land managers around Southern Nevada, think about: It makes me excited because right outside the developed Las Vegas Valley we’ve got more than 7 million acres managed by the Park Service, the BLM, the Fish and Wildlife Service and the Forest Service. Some of the most incredible and diverse resources you’d find anywhere in the United States and they’re right outside the Strip and a lot of people don’t even realize it’s there and the opportunities associated with it. Lake Mead is huge. You could go out and spend an entire day on the lake and not even come close to covering what there is to see and do out there. It would take years to experience everything it has to offer. So folks need to get started.