‘A Morale Bomb’: National Park Workers Face Wage Cuts and 'Dubiously Legal' Review System

As National Park Service leaders grapple with reduced staffing and restrictive, ideological policies, maintenance workers at Yosemite National Park are now also facing a pay cut in 2026 that could reduce hourly wages by as much as $3.50 for some positions.

That’s after the National Park Service told its staff that pay for newly hired or promoted employees will now be based on rates for the Fresno area, instead of Stockton, as they have been for the last 16 years.

The National Federation of Federal Employees’ Local 465, which represents NPS employees at five national parks, including Yosemite, put out a press release this week saying workers were told of the wage change in late November.

The move comes as park service leaders nationwide say they’re being told to make changes to employee reviews and performance ratings that they worry could influence future potential layoffs they fear are coming in the near future.

Former national park employee Elizabeth Villano, a spokesperson for advocacy group Resistance Rangers, called the changes to the review process a “morale bomb” for workers.

“They’re going to continue to push out qualified, passionate civil servants from their job,” she said.

Any wage-grade employee, like maintenance workers for park facilities and trails, hired, promoted or changing positions as of Jan. 1, 2026, will have their pay changed — “a reduction,” the NFFE release said.

One NPS employee who is also a NFFE union representative called the change a “slap in the face” for the hundreds of employees affected, many of whom commute one or even two hours into work and face steep costs of living in and around the Yosemite area. KQED has agreed not to publish the names of employees because they fear retribution.

National parks are still suffering from a 24% reduction in their workforce. While the Department of the Interior has technically lifted its hiring freeze, the NFFE is continuing to raise concerns about the Trump administration’s ongoing policies promoting government efficiency, which have instructed parks to reduce their workforces.

“The loss in pay and the pressure to fill gaps will likely result in added stress to the Yosemite [wage-grade] workers, lower retention, fewer opportunities for workers to detail into different positions to gain career experience, and slower overall park operations,” the release states.

KQED reached out to the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior about the changes, but has not received a response as of the deadline.

Reviews an ‘insult to injury’

Currently underway at parks nationwide is a wider discussion about employee performance plans, whose drafting and implementation have been delayed all year.

According to several national park employees from across the country, NPS leadership has instructed them to abide by a new “quota” or “cap” on high performance ratings — currently issued on a one-to-five scale. Under the revised system, the employees say they’ve been told, only around 30% of employees appear to be allowed to get high ratings. Different parks have been given different numbers over the past week, Villano said, only adding to the confusion.

The NPS employees say this mandate has essentially forced park leaders to artificially deflate their employees’ performance reviews — a move Villano said is akin to “asking employees and supervisors to lie.” She also called the action “dubiously legal” and potentially in violation of the federal code that outlines how performance ratings must occur.

“That’s them taking a dagger into the backs of everyone who’s been working overtime, crushing themselves just to keep the parks open, safe, accessible and the resources protected,” Villano said. “It feels like an insult to injury.”

Park superintendents, she said, were “told explicitly that the management of their park, no matter how above and beyond they were going, was a three, except for if they were managing more than one park, then they could maybe get a four,” Villano said.

One park superintendent, who also asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation or firing, said by the time they got the new instructions, they had already sent out their initial performance reviews. Now, they’re being told to rescind and resubmit them because they didn’t conform to the new requirements, they said.

“Employees across the parks know what they would have gotten and are now going to get something different,” the superintendent said. “All of the park superintendents are having to carry the liability for this.”

Also concerning is the potential “self-fulfilling prophecy” of giving mid-tier grades to most employees, said Bill Wade, executive director of the Association of National Park Rangers.

“If they know ahead of time that they’re gonna be rated as average … over time, that’s exactly what they’re gonna get,” Wade said. “It defies all good sense of leadership.”

Villano said while there is no denying that the park service’s normal system of performance reviews is flawed, these changes have not been thought out or systematic, and she’s worried that low scores could be used to justify future layoffs.

In fact, according to a report from Government Executive, the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is set to propose new formulas for federal layoffs that would base decisions on the weighted sum of their three most recent performance ratings — rather than their time of service at the agency.

In addition to the ethical and legal questions, the anonymous NPS employee and NFFE union representative said the Yosemite wage and performance review changes create a major morale issue for current workers, and are likely to deter prospective ones, too.

“I can’t tell you how many people are looking for jobs actively outside the park,” they said. “It’s just not a winning deal right now to come work for the National Park Service, and that’s a sad thing to say about one of our most beloved institutions.”

Wade agreed, saying that even with the hiring freeze now lifted, the loss of a quarter of permanent positions at the NPS since January 2025 – in addition to reduced numbers of applicants to federal jobs and continued restrictions on hiring – he’s most worried about a coming “experience gap” at parks, and what that would mean for the future of these treasured landmarks..

“People are being asked to do more with less,” he said.

In response to the changes, Villano said park leaders and employees are organizing — the most coordination she’s seen since the February 2025 mass layoffs dubbed the “Valentine’s Day massacre.” She said some have even planned to unilaterally give out the same exact score to everyone so as not to deflate some and not others’ reviews.

“They took it a step too far this time by asking by asking us to turn on each other and tell each other that we’re doing bad work when day in and day out we know how deeply untrue that is,” she said.

Resistance Rangers, she said, is offering information and resources on how to respond, including instructions to help supervisors and employees create a paper trail of how their ratings may be changing and what options they may have, including refusing to sign new performance reviews.

“My message to rangers right now is that even just showing up to work when every single day you’re being told that your work doesn’t matter, and the agency you work for is slowly disintegrating around you — that in and of itself is heroic,” she said.

“There is a community of rangers who are fighting together to make sure that your work doesn’t go unappreciated and unrewarded.”