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1 UNPROTECTED WATERSHEDS The Park Service lacks adequate authority to prevent impairment of park waters from activities on water- shed lands that lie beyond park boundaries. Furthermore, there are very few effective programs requiring watershed-based planning and manage- ment, even for important watersheds. As the case studies described in this Report illustrate, most threats to park waters arise from activities on watershed lands that lie "up drainage" and outside park boundaries. The fundamental problem is that park boundaries usually were drawn to protect spe- cific scenic features or to accommodate political com- promise, rather than to reflect important ecological relationships. Thus, park boundaries seldom include -P~''""r k~.r - -. y ~ ;j~. t ~ ` i M .. Y Y ~~ _ yr •.. ... iLta~ I {~~ ~` „, ~+ ~`~.^~ ~f 4 e ~ ~~„~ . At Acadia and many other parks, park waters are threatened by a tivil ~ on park watershed lands that extend beyond park borders. 15 all, and usually include only a portion, of the water- shed lands that are the critical source of park waters. At Everglades National Park, for example, waters loaded with nutrients and pesticides from agricultural areas north of the park are being flushed into Everglades' fragile wetlands. The nutrient-rich waters have already caused cattails to proliferate and choke out the native sawgrass in conservation areas north of the park, and threaten to wreak similar ecological dis- aster in Everglades. A similar example arises at Acadia National Park, where some of the park's watershed lands lie partially outside park boundaries. For more than 10 years, polluted surface runoff from a landfill located on park watershed lands contaminated Acadia's Marshall Brook, killing fish and other aquatic wildlife. And at Dinosaur National Monu- ment and Zion National Park, dams proposed upstream of the parks' boundaries threaten to dimin- ish river flows critical to park resources. Despite the seriousness of these and innumerable similar problems, Park Service authority to directly regulate harmful activities on park watershed lands that extend beyond park boundaries remains uncer- y ~: Y ~ ` r~~ .!L ,~ .....t~'.~ >