요세미티 국립공원: 쇠퇴하는 환경과 관리 문제

### 요세미티 국립공원의 악화되는 환경: 책임에 대한 요구
* 🏞 한때 자연 애호가들의 천국이었던 요세미티 국립공원은 특히 **양허권자인 아라마크의 감독 하에 심각한 안전 및 관리 문제**에 직면해 있습니다.
* 📉 2016년부터 2023년까지의 연방 평가에 따르면 **아화니 호텔은 심각한 유지보수 실패**로 인해 근로자와 야생동물 모두의 환경이 위험할 정도로 악화되고 있습니다.
* 💰 2016년 아라마크가 인수한 이후 **연간 약 1억 4천만 달러의 매출**을 올렸지만, 안전과 표준을 유지하는 데 어려움을 겪으며 **천장 붕괴, 화학물질 유출 등 수많은 사고**가 발생했습니다.
* 🚨 보고서에 따르면 아라마크는 **머세드 강 근처에서 발생한 500갤런의 글리콜 유출 사고**와 **100명이 넘는 사람들에게 영향을 미친 노로바이러스 발생** 등 중대한 안전 사고를 공개하지 않았습니다.
* 🐭 한타바이러스를 옮길 가능성이 있는 쥐가 서식하는 등 비위생적인 주거 환경이 일부 직원들에게 **심각한 건강 문제**를 일으켰다는 보고가 있었습니다.
* 📜 국립공원관리청은 아라마크의 여러 공원에서 수준 이하의 성과**를 기록**했으며, 관리 개선에 대한 요구에도 불구하고 **요세미티에서 계속 운영되는 것에 대한 의문**을 제기했습니다.
* 🔍 연방 당국의 조사가 강화되면서 **와와나 호텔은 무기한 폐쇄**되었고, **국립공원 관리 기준 개선의 필요성**이 강조되고 있습니다.
* 📣 대중은 국립공원에 대한 더 높은 기대치를 요구하며 **미래 세대를 위해 더 나은 음식, 숙박, 전반적인 경험**을 옹호해야 합니다.

아라마크가 관리하는 요세미티 국립공원의 관리가 실패하면서 근로자의 안전과 방문객의 경험이 위협받고 있습니다.

Yosemite National Park, a nature lover's dream, is slowly turning into a nightmare. About a month into working at Yosemite is when I started getting very, very sick. Hundreds of pages of federal evaluations going back to 2016, up until 2023, really point to how conditions at Yosemite National Park have become more dangerous for workers and wildlife alike, with the national concessionaire, Aramark, being blamed for the rapid decline. The popular Ahwahnee Hotel, where President Barack Obama and even the Queen of England once stayed, is in shambles. Everything from hotel ceiling collapses to chemical spills and mismanaged wildlife has made the park's safety questionable. The national parks belong to the American people. We expect our national parks to be better managed and put demands on Congress and the National Park Service and the administration to step up and improve this situation. Aramark is this $9 billion global hospitality company that many Americans encounter in some way or another in the course of their

lives. It runs college cafeterias, ballpark concessions, hospitals, prisons even, and part of their portfolio includes national parks, more than a dozen of them. And Yosemite became part of Aramark's portfolio in 2016. Since then, with some variation, particularly related to Covid, they've brought in about $140 million a year. So over the 15-year term of this contract, it's worth a little over $2 billion. So what's going on in Yosemite is an example of a deeper, a more complicated and systemic issue that we have with concessions, private sector operations within the national parks. The law governing commercial concessions in national parks is unique to the National Park Service. There's no other federal statute like it provides lots of incentives to the concessioner. They make considerable profit. The problem is, is that the tools given to the National Park Service to enforce poor performance are extremely limited.

Allegations of Aramark's failure to meet its contractual obligations have been borne out by numerous incidents throughout the park. So in Yosemite, Aramark is contractually obligated to run about 9 different lodging options, 23 restaurants and cafes, over a dozen gift shops and grocery stores, as well as 3 gas stations, 4 swimming pools, a ski mountain, horseback rides, a tow truck service, almost everything you can imagine being available to you in a national park, Aramark was responsible to run. Some sources actually compared it to something like a small city. Just this past year, a chunk of ceiling collapsed onto a worker while visitors were dining there, a railing at another hotel in the park failed when a visitor was leaning on it, causing it to collapse, and she was injured. That was an incident that Aramark did not report to the National Park Service. The year prior, workers had spilled 500 gallons of glycol,

which is the potentially toxic main ingredient and antifreeze 500 feet from the Merced River, which flows through the park. The company had failed to report bedbug infestations, a norovirus outbreak that ultimately sickened more than a hundred people. The list really goes on and on top of that, dozens of former and current workers in the park who shared a number of other details about the company's management, including their housing conditions. I was at Yosemite for about three months, and one month in is when I started getting very, very sick. I remember when I first got there, I was put into a tent. It's almost like a military-style tent where it's a canvas tent on a plywood platform. There was a giant hole in the floor that was letting in mice and causing a mouse infestation. There were times when we had mouse poop in our beds on our pillowcases. There was one point where they were even nesting in our dresser,

in our clothes. Rau and her roommates were alarmed, immediately alerting the housing department, as signs around Yosemite warned that mice may carry Hantavirus. I started getting major flu-like symptoms, really bad fever. At the hospital, they did a ton of different tests and they started asking me questions about where I was living, what it was like at Yosemite. And when they told them about the mice, they kind of put the dots together that this was most likely Hantavirus. At Yosemite and several other parks like Michigan's Isle Royale and Oregon's Crater Lake, Aramark has repeatedly received subpar ratings from the National Park Service. The National Park Service planning to terminate its contract with Aramark, which owns Crater Lake Hospitality. And there the issues really echo Yosemite cases like a 5,000-gallon sewage spill and multiple visitor injuries that were sustained under Aramark's watch there. We didn't really see any change until a senator from that state,

Ron Wyden publicly issued a statement calling for a federal review of the contract. In December, I learned of very alarming issues with the private concessionaire at Crater Lake National Park. It was clear that NPS staff were working tirelessly to prevent the contractor issues from damaging irreplaceable park resources. And within a couple of months, Aramark's contract there was transferred to a new company. So given all the complaints citing Aramark's substandard service at Crater Lake, why are they still being allowed to operate at Yosemite? We only have three major concessioners competing with each other, Xanterra, Delaware North, and Aramark. And as the net result is, I would say performance is mediocre at best across the entire National Park system in terms of quality of meals, in terms of quality of lodging, in terms of facilities, reinvestment in these infrastructures. Aramark appears to be feeling pressure from the mounting criticism.

In a statement, the company listed several repair and construction projects, noted the replacement of top executives, and rehiring of maintenance staff. But the National Park Service recently announced on Instagram that the 168-year-old Wawona Hotel will shut down indefinitely in December as federal officials increase oversight of the global hospitality provider. I think the public needs to speak out. The public says we expect our national parks to be better managed. We expect our experiences to be at a higher standard. We expect the food to be a higher standard. We expect our lodging to be a higher standard, and we need to invest in this so that our kids and their children can experience the national parks at their best.

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요세미티 국립공원의 악화되는 상황

요세미티 국립공원은 2016년부터 2023년까지 연방정부에서 실시한 평가에 따르면 근로자와 야생동물에게 위험한 환경에 직면해 있으며, 그 쇠퇴가 두드러지고 있습니다.

국립공원 관리자인 아라마크는 호텔 천장 붕괴, 화학물질 유출과 같은 안전 문제를 일으켜 공원의 잘못된 관리로 인해 비난을 받아왔습니다.

국립공원의 상업적 양보에 관한 독특한 법률은 수익에 대한 인센티브를 제공하지만 국립공원관리청이 성과를 강제할 수 있는 도구가 제한되어 있어 시스템적인 문제로 이어집니다.

요세미티에서 논란이 되고 있는 아라마크의 관리 방식

아라마크는 다양한 서비스를 책임지고 있는 요세미티에서 계약 의무를 이행하지 않았다는 수많은 의혹에 직면해 있습니다.

천장 붕괴, 난간 고장, 유독물 유출 등의 사건과 함께 보고되지 않은 빈대 감염 및 노로바이러스 발생으로 인해 우려를 불러일으켰습니다.

전직 및 현직 직원들은 쥐의 침입과 비위생적인 생활 환경 등 주거 환경에 대한 우려스러운 세부 사항을 공유했습니다.

국립공원에서의 한타바이러스 발생과 아라마크의 논란

요세미티에서 라우와 그녀의 룸메이트는 쥐로 인해 한타바이러스가 발병하여 독감과 유사한 심각한 증상을 경험하고 입원 치료를 받았습니다.

요세미티와 다른 국립공원의 양허권자인 아라마크는 하수 유출과 방문객 부상 등 여러 가지 문제에 직면하여 낮은 평가를 받았습니다.

비판과 불만에도 불구하고 아라마크는 요세미티에서 계속 운영되고 있으며 국립공원 시스템 전반의 평균적인 성과에 기여하고 있습니다.

와와나 호텔의 변화와 대중의 기대치

이 회사는 다양한 수리 프로젝트, 경영진 교체, 직원 재고용을 발표했습니다.

하지만 와워나 호텔은 연방 정부의 감독 강화로 인해 12월에 무기한 폐쇄될 예정입니다.

대중은 국립공원 체험, 음식, 숙박 시설에 대한 더 나은 관리와 더 높은 기준을 요구하고 있습니다.