MOSS LANDING STATE BEACH, Calif. -- There's no two ways about it, your state parks are in danger.
No, it's not forest fires, invasive pests, or pollution.
Randy Widera, with the Californa State Park Foundation, said it's the state budget cuts.
"State parks are in crisis..the cut's are just too deep." Widera says.
Twenty two million dollars deep, to be exact.
Funding usually set aside for cleaning, revitalization and supervising the parks isn't there anymore.
That's where the non-profit steps in.
Widera says, "We're acting in one voice so that the legislature and the people in Sacramento understand the value in what we are losing, by making these cuts"
Since 1969, the California State Park Foundation has acted as a political voice to protect all of California's 279 state parks.
Volunteers who walk the steps of our capitol, if necessary, and organize clean-up efforts and educational outreach missions to protect the natural wildlife.
"You start here by restoring the native plant community and all the animal communities that are dependent upon it are able to be sustained and they come back." Randy Widera says.
Ecosystems won't be the only thing disappearring if state parks close.
Lost tourist dollars will impact your local economy.
For example, the Department of Parks and Recreation said more than 10,000 people reserved state park spaces this Memorial Day weekend.
Spaces that may not be there next year, if lawmakers don't find new funding fast.
For people like Randy Widera, that's unacceptable.
Randy Widera shakes his head and exclaims, "As Californians, we pride ourselves in having a deep relationship with what it means to have natural resources in our cultural heritage. And to abandon them is to almost abandon what it means to be a Californian."
This week, lawmakers will hear new revenue source proposals that include customized license plates, raising the cost of yearly park passes, or re-directing money from other state services.
