America’s national parks — 483 units with 23 different designations — have a documented $12 billion backlog of much needed repair, restoration and replacement. Like a good weed, the amount grows each year (it was $11.5 billion a year ago) to the detriment of our National Park Service areas.

There is no sign that Congress is ready to appropriate even a fraction of this backlog. As a result, it is time for a dramatic change in how the parks are managed and operate.

As a retired superintendent of parks such as Glacier, Big Bend, Valley Forge and Wolf Trap, I know it will be hard to make some needed choices. These are not easy nor will they be popular with everyone, but they include:

1. Decide which park units should be closed, overseen by a small caretaker staff; which should operate with reduced hours and days; and which might be rested during certain periods of time and then opened seasonally. This would allow for funds and personnel to be shifted to areas suffering damage and needing support.

These decisions would be made by a national commission made up of highly professional personnel from organizations that support and work with the parks as well as universities and key personnel from the NPS. The commission would also recommend other changes in the management and operation of the National Park Service to assure protection of the areas for future generations, unencumbered.

2. With visitation to the national parks now exceeding more than 340 million visits per year, some parks must be allowed to limit visitors. How many and how often will the ruins at Mesa Verde be able to accommodate visitors without damage and loss? How many buses and visitors can Old Faithful deal with and how long should lines be at restroom facilities? Issues and concerns that currently exist that need to be addressed by the new commission and park managers.

Read:These were the most-visited national parks in the U.S. in 2018

3. Entrance fees and other fees at parks should be increased and retained by the park doing the collecting. U.S. residents would pay one fee while international visitors would pay a higher fee.

4. Construction, engineering, design and development programs dealing with the infrastructure of a park should be contracted for with local or regional firms with extensive experience in their fields. Using local or regional firms who know the resource, the flora and fauna, the weather patterns, seasonal issues and other matters saves money and gives best value.

5. Until the financial backlog is resolved, new sites recommended for inclusion in the National Park Service must meet a far more rigid set of criteria and benchmarks.

Because of the economic value that parks and monuments bring to local and regional communities, parks are much sought after by members of Congress and the executive branch. It is imperative that when considering a newly recommended national park unit that it has national or international significance. Sites that are of a regional or local significance shouldn’t be considered suitable.

Read:Congress passes largest public lands bill in more than a decade

6. Currently the designation of national monuments is being provided to other agencies with vastly different policies. The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah is a prime example. It is not an NPS National Monument, although everyone thinks it is. It is a BLM (Bureau of Land Management) National Monument.

With no disrespect to the BLM and its mission and workforce, BLM’s mission is to deal with excess federal land holdings and to maximize underlying value of the areas, which can include mining, forestry, grazing, hunting, commercial developments and activities. BLM is not a new version of the NPS, and National Monuments, like National Parks, are names that have national and international significance. They are trademarks of the National Park Service and recognized as such.

7. Hire more paid staff. Over the past 20 years, the number of permanent employees has declined by the thousands and now stands at 18,000. Seasonal workers, in all areas, have been seriously reduced while the number of volunteer workers has increased to 220,000 people. Volunteers are a great value to the service, and they are a great source of help, but they cannot do all the things that seasonal and permanent employees do.

We have been here before. In 1955, because of World War II and Korea, our parks were not in good shape and many complained of their condition. Bernard DeVoto in Harper’s Magazine proposed that the national parks should all be closed until they were funded appropriately, not just a few. Under public pressure, President Dwight Eisenhower and NPS Director Conrad Wirth created “Mission 66”, a 10-year program funded by the Congress to repair and restore the National Parks by 1966, the 50th anniversary celebrating the creation of the NPS. Today, Congress could easily create a “Mission 33” program to undo our backlog by 2033.

Americans need to ask elected officials why our national parks are being treated as vestiges of the past. The National Park Service yields more than $85 billion every year to communities and states — yet NPS units cost taxpayers $2.5 billion a year for operations.

National Parks are rightly described as America’s Living Treasures, and they deserve to be treated with more respect. The National Park Service, the units managed and the unique philosophies they represent belong to all the people and should be managed by professionals, not politicians.

Gil Lusk spent 35 years working for the National Parks Service and is the author of “National Parks, Our Living Treasures; A Time for Concern.”