As reported in yesterday’s Lantern, Ohio may start charging admission to its state parks as early as next year. As it sits now, a number of things inside the parks like camping and boating already have fees, but admission is still free – making Ohio one of only eight states that does not specifically charge for admission.
This potential change has come around in large part because of the state’s budget crisis. While legislators continue to look for place to cut costs, the state park system has already been cut by 17 percent – which equates to millions of dollars lost. As a result, the state parks have been forced to rely on volunteers to do a large part of the workload.
Some may argue against charging taxpayers admission to state parks when their taxes are already funding the park, but this solution is an excellent one. It is certainly better that people who use the parks are charged $10 for entrance as opposed to cutting way back on services or even shutting the parks down.
It is true that most people who go to these parks are already paying for them with their tax dollars, but there are plenty of other people who don’t go to these places that are also funding state parks with their taxes. The people who are actually taking advantage of these services should help cover some of the cost. Someone who uses the services the state has to offer at these parks has more to lose from cutbacks than somebody who never goes out to these places.
Charging admission also covers users of the parks whose taxes do not fund the park – namely, out-of-state visitors. Someone from Michigan or Indiana has contributed nothing financially to Ohio’s state park, but that person would still get to enjoy the services the taxpayers helped provide. Forcing these out-of-staters to pay an admission fee would make them help pay for the things they are enjoying at Ohio’s parks.
In a perfect world, everyone would admitted free of charge to these state parks because extra funding would not be needed. However, Ohio’s budget situation has brought drastic measures upon the parks. Ideally, nobody would have to pay to make copies at taxpayer-funded libraries because the libraries’ budgets would cover it. However, the limited funds the state has forces the people who use facilities such as these to help cover some of the costs. What is worse: having to pay for copies or getting rid of the stacks of books in the libraries?
A lot of people enjoy the many services Ohio’s state parks have to offer, and a lot of other people don’t. Yet, they both help fund the park and its services. It is not unreasonable to ask those who use the parks to pay an extra fee.
