06/18/09

Last winter – Idaho Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter ordered state agencies to cut their expenses by total of four percent; those budget cuts are finally filtering down, and have translated into less hours of operation for some Idaho state parks.

In previous years, campers have been able to use the eight cabins and 82 campsites at Three Island Crossing State Park near Glenns Ferry from Wednesday through Sunday. But state budget reductions has caused the park, which opens Friday, June 19th, to limit it's days of operations this summer to Friday through Sunday.

Kathy Pruett, Office Specialist at Three Island Crossing says, “Over the years we have reduced the hours from year to year anyway. This is the most severe cutback I guess, in hours of operation.

Pruett says last year the park employed about a dozen seasonal workers for the summer; but this year, those jobs have been shaved to just three 40 hour a week positions. Unfortunately, that also means that if someone wants to park their camper here and it's not Friday through Sunday between 9am and 4 pm, the park employees at the gate have to turn them away.

Bobby Chustz, a camper from Louisiana says, “It has enough room from one camper to the next. Most places we go, they're right against each other. Right here you can breathe a little bit. So it really is a nice park.”

Pruett says a record number of people are camping at Three Island Crossing, and that more than two thirds of the license plates are from right here in the Gem State. She says while that's fairly typical, last year's high gasoline prices also meant plenty of Idahoans camped at Three Island Crossing.

“We hope to be open through the end of September, early October on that three day schedule. I think that we'll survive this budget crisis. We'll come out of it and we'll open longer hours as money permits,” said Pruett.