According to a new National Parks Report, 14,639 visitors to Sagamore Hill National Historic Site in 2012 spent $787,700 in communities near the park. That spending supported nine jobs in the local area. These statistics are part of a nationwide report by the U.S. Geological Survey for the National Parks Service that showed $14.7 billion of direct spending by 283 million park visitors in communities within 60 miles of a national park. This spending supported 243,000 jobs nationally, with 201,000 jobs found in these gateway communities, and had a cumulative benefit to the U.S. economy of $26.75 billion.
“Sagamore Hill is proud to welcome visitors from across the country and around the world,” said Sagamore Hill National Historic Site Superintendent Kelly Fuhrmann. “We are delighted to share the story of this place and the experiences it provides and to use the park as a way to introduce our visitors to this part of the country and all that it offers.”
The National Park Service has conducted Visitor Services Project (VSP) surveys since 1988. These surveys measure visitor characteristics and satisfaction at select parks. The VSP data is used to segment visitors by type of trip. NPS recreation visitors are split into seven distinct visitor segments in order to help explain differences in spending across user groups. These include local day trip, non-local day trip, NPS Lodge, NPS Campground, Motel Outside Park, Camp Outside Park and other.
Spending is broken down into eight different categories that are derived from the data. They are hotels and motels, camping fees, restaurants and bars, groceries and take-out food, gas and oil, local transportation, admission and fees and souvenirs and other expenses.
“A lot of our visitors stay here and shop and have lunch or go into the Village of Oyster Bay and shop at stores,” said park ranger Scott Gurney. “We also encourage them to visit other sites in the area like Raynham Hall and the Oyster Bay Railroad Museum.”
Gurney added that since Sagamore Hill does not provide lodging, “non-local visitors will usually stay at the East Norwich Inn or travel to Woodbury, Plainview and Syosset for lodging facilities.”
As rosy as this picture is, Sagamore Hill saw reduced funding and a decreased budget in 2012.
“As a result of sequestration we had reduced funding in 2012 and this had a circle down effect,” said Fuhrmann. “This led to a lower budget this year and some of our staff going from full time to part time positions.”
Fuhrmann said that the majority of staff who were affected by the reduced budget were seasonal workers.
“We adjusted accordingly and 2015 looks to be a good year for us here at Sagamore Hill.”
