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REMARKS AS PREPARED FOR DELIVERY
FOR THE HONORABLE DIRK KEMPTHORNE
SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR
NATIONAL PARK FOUNDATION SUMMIT ON PHILANTHROPY AND PARTNERSHIP
AUSTIN, TEXAS
OCTOBER 15, 2007

Mrs. Bush, I am honored to be with you in your native state of Texas that you love and in this city of Austin where you lived as the First Lady of Texas. Mrs. Bush, you are first in the hearts of Texans and in the hearts of all Americans.

You are among friends who share your passion for parks. We all thank you for taking up the cause of national parks. You honor us by being the Honorary Chair of the National Park Foundation.

I have been with you at other national park events. Your remarks, like those today, always express with dignity and class your love for our national parks.

I welcome Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and his wife, Wendy, the great Governor of Hawaii and my friend Linda Lingle, and our tremendous National Park Service Director Mary Bomar. I thank Regan Gammon, Vin Cipola and the entire National Park Foundation for hosting this summit. All of you share a love for national parks and the great outdoors.

I am inspired to be with all of you attending this summit. You are philanthropists who appreciate investments. You have investments that appreciate. You deserve to be appreciated for your private and public investments.

You understand money. You know how to make money, how to invest money and how to donate money. This morning I hope to show you money in a way that you have never seen before.

Take, for example, a $100 dollar bill. On the back is Independence Hall where the Declaration of Independence was signed. Independence Hall is one of our great national parks.

Consider the $50 dollar bill. On the front is President Ulysses S. Grant. President Grant signed the law making Yellowstone our first national park. His gravesite, in New York City, is a national park.

Next, look at a $20 dollar bill. On the back is the White House, which is a national park. I think it is great that President and Mrs. Bush have been living in a national park for the last seven years.

Consider the $5 dollar bill. On the back is the Lincoln Memorial, another national park. It was President Lincoln who signed the declaration setting aside the land for Yosemite National Park.

Consider the $2 bill which depicts the signing of our Declaration of Independence inside Independence Hall -- again, a national park.

Nine of the new state quarters depict Mount Rushmore, Jamestown, the Statue of Liberty, Yosemite, St. Louis Arch, Mount Rainier, Crater Lake, Chimney Rock and Wright Brothers at Kitty Hawk, all national parks. The copper penny features the Lincoln Memorial as well.

I hope this helps you -- who know money -- to see money in a different light.

Clearly, money is printed and minted to be given to national parks.

Of course it should not be surprising that our national parks are the icons of our U.S. currency.

Americans love their parks. Yosemite and Yellowstone, Grand Canyon and Grand Teton, Shiloh and Shenandoah, and other parks are sanctuaries of enjoyment, recreation, learning, and personal renewal. They preserve majestic natural wonders and offer spectacular backcountry hiking. They are home to buffalo, moose, spawning salmon, and birds of all feathers.

They help us keep watch over battlefields hallowed by red badges of courage. Parks keep culture alive at sites dedicated to the performing arts, poetry, and music. Urban parks introduce inner-city children to outdoor wonders. Parks teach and inspire. Parks are America the beautiful -- the cultural -- the historical.

Our goal, at this summit, is to ignite a new era of philanthropy and partnership with our national parks.

The National Park Service enjoys a rich tradition of philanthropy. Thirty national parks were created through philanthropic donations.

David Rockefeller is here. Gifts from the Rockefeller Family started or expanded 21 national parks. When Americans visit Grand Teton and Great Smoky, Glacier and the Grand Canyon, Acadia and Antietam, their presence thanks the Rockefeller family whose gifts make national parks the envy of the world.

It?s noteworthy that when Queen Elizabeth came to the United States a few months ago, she visited the White House, Jamestown and the World War II Memorial ? all national parks.

We need to ignite a new era of giving to national parks. The cause is noble, the need is great, the opportunities are immense.

Americans are generous people. In 2005, Americans donated $260 billion dollars to great causes. About one third of that -- $90 billion -- went to education, environment, health, arts, culture and the humanities.

In that same year, the National Park Service received $27 million in cash gifts. We are extremely grateful for that $27 million. I believe Americans will increase that amount if asked. And that is why we are here.

A fair question is this: Shouldn?t the government fund operations at national parks?

The answer, plain and simple is, yes. Absolutely yes.

When I first became Secretary of the Interior, I spoke to Roland Betts, Nancy Bechtle, Curt Bucholz and others in this room. I spoke by telephone to others ? people like Lee Iacocca. I heard one clear unifying message. Philanthropic donors will not pay for what government should, but they will give to improve excellence at our parks.

Soon after these conversations, I met with President Bush one-on-one, in the Oval Office. We talked about the budget for national parks. We talked about the need to inspire more philanthropic giving to the national parks.

What emerged from that conversation -- and perhaps from a few conversations he had with the First Lady -- were three bold decisions by the President.

First, the President proposed the largest operating budget and the largest ever one year increase in that operating budget in the history of the National Park Service. This budget will put 3,000 more seasonal rangers in our national parks. This budget will improve cultural and natural resources at parks all across America. Part of that operating increase for 2008 is $100 million that will be devoted to projects to prepare parks for their 100th anniversary in 2016. Second, the President proposed continuing that $100 million for each of the next nine years -- all for projects to improve national parks for that 100th anniversary.

The President didn?t stop there. The President?s third decision turned the ignition key to start a new era of philanthropic giving.

In addition to increasing the parks? operating budget now and in the future, the President proposed another $1 billion -- $100 million a year for the next ten years ? of mandatory spending when matched by an equal amount of philanthropic dollars. This is the Centennial Challenge Matching Fund.

The good news continues in that the President?s National Park Service operating budget received strong bipartisan support in Congress.

Representative Norm Dicks, the Democratic Chairman of the National Parks Budget, called me on a weekend to say thanks for the great National Parks budget. The House of Representatives approved the operating budget, and the Senate is ready to do so as well.

This is what I call, ?show me the money.? Government is stepping up to its responsibility for parks.

We are now working with the House and Senate to pass the Centennial Challenge Matching Fund legislation.

Now is the time to ignite new levels of giving to match past traditions and to achieve new levels of excellence.

Last year, the National Park Service asked me to celebrate its 90th anniversary at Yellowstone. Rather than blow out 90 candles on a cake, I used the event to begin preparing parks for their 100th anniversary in the year 2016.

I went to Yellowstone carrying a directive from President Bush. He told me to go out and ask Americans about their vision for our national parks. He told me to establish specific performance goals to prepare our parks for their second century. He told me to identify centennial projects and programs that continue the legacy of leveraging philanthropic, partnership and government investment for our parks.

I did what the President told me to do.

Mary Bomar and I -- along with park service employees -- held 40 listening sessions with park employee across America and heard Americans? passionate ideas for our parks. Last May, I gave this report proposing five bold goals national parks must achieve.

Parks must:

After writing these goals, we asked Americans to work with park superintendents and jointly propose their best ideas for public-private projects and programs.

When we first started, people told me that we would be lucky to raise $20 million of new philanthropic donations.

What did we actually accomplish?

This notebook contains the 321 written letters of commitment from Americans across the country pledging $301 million dollars of their money for Centennial projects.

Once Congress approves the Centennial Challenge Matching Fund legislation, that $301 million will be available to benefit parks all around the country ? large parks, small parks and parks in between. In fact, 1 out of every 3 parks will benefit from these philanthropic commitments ? in just the first year.

Rebecca Rimel from the Pew Charitable Trusts is here. Two days after the President announced his Centennial Challenge Matching Fund, Rebecca said if the federal government would commit $6 million to restore the Benjamin Franklin Museum, she would match it. Then she got Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell, a Democrat, to commit another $6 million -- for a total of $18 million.

Restoring the Benjamin Franklin Museum is just one of 200 exciting Centennial Challenge projects selected by a team of National Park Service career employees. The First Lady has already mentioned that Texans committed their funds to save endangered sea turtles at Padre Island. Here are two other examples:

We have the goals, we have the projects. What is needed now is for Democrats and Republicans in Congress to pass the Centennial Challenge Matching Fund legislation.

I hope you will encourage Congress to pass the Centennial Challenge bill before they adjourn this year.

After all, National Parks are not a Republican issue. They are not a Democrat issue. They are an American issue. Because of that, I am confident Congress will pass the legislation this year.

Once they do, it will be my responsibility to ensure that every philanthropic and public dollar is well spent.

I believe in a walk around style of management. I heard a story I needed to hear during a tour of the new visitor center being constructed at Grand Teton National Park.

This center was being built with public and private funds. My tour was conducted by its donors. They told me the National Park Service made it difficult for donors to give, to get projects approved. For them, the P in NPS stood for process, not park.

They pointed out an area next to the visitor center where they had intended to build, completely with donated funds, an auditorium and learning center where children could learn about the environment. The auditorium project was stopped, however, because it did not fit within the Park Service?s national facility computer model specifications.

It took me less than a week to reverse that decision. Today, that auditorium addition is being designed and will be built.
We are serious about making sure that every philanthropic and public dollar invested in the Centennial Challenge is accountable, transparent and is spent to achieve its intended purpose.

To make sure actions back up these words, I directed Interior?s Deputy Secretary Lynn Scarlett and Director Mary Bomar to streamline procedures so that partners find it easier to work with the National Park Service. I also asked our Department?s Inspector General Earl Devaney to work with the National Park Service to make sure Congress, contributors and citizens would know on a ?real time? basis where all funds are being spent.

How money is spent is the lynchpin to success. Big ideas attract big money.

My vision for the year 2016 ? when the National Park Service turns 100 ? is to have a multitude of public-private Centennial projects completed that in tangible ways improve parks and help visitors.

My vision is to find donors willing to preserve the last remaining Civil War Battlefields. Gettysburg, where bravery and Lincoln?s address are long remembered, has 120 acres of battlefields that need to be acquired before they are commercially developed.

My vision is to better protect the cultural resources within our parks. In 2009, we celebrate the 200th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln?s boyhood home in Hodgenville, Kentucky, is one of our national parks. The condition of the home where Lincoln lived was described by the park superintendent there as ranging from ?poor to deplorable.?

Folks, Abraham Lincoln is on the front of our $5 dollar bill. I hope that someone in this room will inspire Americans to donate their Lincoln $5 dollar bills to preserve Lincoln?s boyhood home in time for the 200th anniversary of his birth.

My vision ? and the vision of General Tommy Franks -- is to complete the Flight 93 Memorial to honor the memories of those heroes of September 11th.

My vision is to make the National Mall in Washington the standard of excellence for all to see and enjoy. The area around the Jefferson memorial is becoming a mudflat with decaying sidewalks. Within five years we should restore the National Mall in time for the 100th anniversary of the planting of the cherry blossom trees.

My vision is to find donors willing to give to a dedicated Parks Land Acquisition fund. These funds, either alone or leveraged with federal funds, will acquire lands in Mount Rainier, Virgin Islands, Wind Cave and other national parks.

My vision is to find donors who will fund programs to get fourth graders -- the class of 2016 -- to nearby national parks where they can experience culture, history and environment that our national parks preserve.

We are nowhere near tapping the full potential of philanthropic giving to national parks. Just ask Steve Briganti who is here from the Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island Foundation.

In the 1980s, $550 million dollars was raised to restore the Statue of Liberty. As Mrs. Bush said, school children sent in copper pennies ? totaling more than $6 million dollars.

If school children can donate $6 million dollars in Lincoln pennies for Lady Liberty, think how much we can donate in Lincoln $5 bills for Lincoln?s boyhood home.

This summit is the right place, at the right time, with the right leaders to write a bold new chapter in national park history.

Mrs. Bush, thank you for being our honorary chair. Regan Gammon, Vin Cipola, and the entire National Park Foundation, thank you for hosting this summit.

Mary Bomar, your 17 years of commitment to those proud to wear the flat hats and green and gray uniforms make you the perfect Director of the National Park Service at this historic time. Mary Bomar is a leader. She works incredibly hard to make sure government effectively manages its national parks. I am proud to serve with you.

To each of you here, know that it is within our grasp to increase excellence at parks all across America. An America whose money carries the images of Independence Hall, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Statue of Liberty wants their love affair with their national parks to endure.

Together, we can ensure that the golden years of our national parks are not in the past but lie ahead.

Thank you and God bless you.