Bush to visit Cove

Bush to visit Cove

2005-04-16
by Thomas Fraser
of The Daily Times Staff

President Bush will visit Cades Cove next Friday to mark Earth Day and honor volunteers who donate time to Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

The White House confirmed the president's plans early Friday; staff of Rep. John J. Duncan Jr., who will accompany the president to America's most-visited national park, announced the visit Thursday.

Bush will also be accompanied to the Park by Maryville native Sen. Lamar Alexander, who has a residence in West Millers Cove near the Park boundary.

Friday's visit, the first presidential trip to the Park since its dedication by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1940, will be in part to honor Park volunteers. About 2,129 volunteers donated 111,935 hours to the Park last year. That equates to 50 staff positions worth $1.9 million, according to Park officials.

Alexander is happy any time the president comes to Tennessee," said press secretary Alexia Poe.This time, he'll be hosting the president in his own back yard."

Park spokesman Bob Miller said he expected Secret Service agents in the Park early next week to begin pinning down details and planning for security. According to the White House, Bush will participate in an unspecified public service project in Cades Cove before making remarks on the significance of Earth Day, a global observance of the importance of the planet's natural systems.

So far we haven't settled on a specific site to do that," Miller said. Cades Cove is a leading site."

Honoring volunteers

``The president looks forward to this visit to highlight the Park's volunteer program," said White House spokesman Taylor Goss. Bush is

expected to arrive on Air Force One at McGhee Tyson Airport between late morning and early afternoon and then travel to Cades Cove, Goss said.

Bush is also expected to touch upon Park air quality issues, including his proposed Clean Air Interstate Rule, which some environmental groups have characterized as inadequate to address the Park's air pollution problems.
Don Barger, director of the National Parks Conservation Association's Southeastern office, said the proposed rules would hamper controls on emissions from power plants and industry that locate next to the Great Smokies or other Class I areas that merit special protection under the Clean Air Act.

Levels of some air pollutants in the Park have posted declines in the past decades, and Miller attributed that to both reduced emissions and wet, rainy weather in summer months of recent years.

``All that is going in the right direction. Obviously we have a long ways to go," to return to natural atmospheric conditions, Miller said.

``We certainly disagree with the administration on air quality issues," Barger said. However, Barger held out hope Bush would use the occasion to further proposals the conservation association deems important to American national parks.

Among them are the proposed National Parks Centennial Act, sponsored in part by Duncan, which would establish check-off boxes on federal income tax returns to allow for voluntary donations to the National Park Service. Barger said the legislation could raise up to $600 million to address national park maintenance backlogs by 2016, the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the National Park Service.

I'd love to see the president come out and support Congressman Duncan's legislation," Barger said.It would be a huge step forward to get that support from the White House." He said results of a Zogby poll commissioned by the National Parks Conservation Association suggested 61 percent of taxpayers would be likely" orvery likely" to contribute money.

Transportation funding

Barger pointed to another positive legislative effort from the administration.

NPCA supports the president's (proposed) doubling of the national park's road budget," Barger said.The Smokies is a poster child for a lot of transportation projects."

The money could be applied not only to capital road improvements, but other transportation-related projects including further studies of mass transit and transportation planning for gateway communities such as Townsend.

"It's going to be real interesting to see what he chooses to talk about," Barger said. "If the president is coming to the Smokies just to push his air proposal, he's probably going to run into a lot of opposition," Barger said.

If, however, he covers the gamut of issues facing the Smokies and presses for change, "a lot of people will be happy to see him. I know I will be," Barger said.

At least one area environmental group is already planning to make hay of the president's visit.

In an e-mail to supporters, Knoxville-based Southern Alliance for Clean Energy President Stephen Smith urged participation in protests on Friday.

"This will be a great opportunity to highlight to the president and the national media the effects that poor air quality and global warming have on the treasured Smokies and our local area," Smith wrote.