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GCNP rangers<br>work Olympics

GC VILLAGE — While Olympic athletes in Salt Lake City go for the gold, the mammoth security operation going on behind the scenes includes several National Park Service employees. In fact, Grand Canyon National Park is "well represented" at the Games.

Al Nash, information officer for the National Park Service’s incident management team, said he can’t reveal just how many staffers came in from Grand Canyon or their names "because some include law enforcement." Since the Secret Service is heading up the security operation, GCNP rangers working there are considered to be field agents.

"Grand Canyon is very well represented," Nash said in a telephone interview from Salt Lake City. "We have people here serving in security positions, people working with media and visitor services, and people on our incident management team."

Local residents with connections to the NPS can probably figure out which rangers are on assignment in Utah. Grand Canyon rangers apparently appealed to those in charge of security.

"We certainly have people who work at Grand Canyon who either use particular snow skills or gained those skills on duty at another Park Service location," Nash said.

As a national security event, the Secret Service was empowered to utilize any federal law-enforcement agencies for assistance at the Olympics.

"In our case with the NPS, they came to us because we have rangers who are federal law-enforcement officers who also have some winter skills," Nash said. "That’s not the easiest thing to find among federal law-enforcement agencies."

Nash said the Olympics operation has been virgin territory for NPS employees.

"None of us have ever seen anything like this," Nash said. "I’ve been in and out of this town as we were planning part of our involvement and I’ve been here for about three weeks now. The transformation of this city almost daily is dramatic."

There have been varying figures on just how many law-enforcement officers are on hand for the Olympics, but combining local, state, federal and the National Guard, there are at least 12,000.

"There’s certainly no shortage of visible law enforcement," Nash said. "That’s only part of it … there’s a lot of security presence that you can see and a lot that’s out there that you can’t see."

Although many may believe that plans for Olympic security were heightened after Sept. 11, Nash said the original intention was to provide the current level of policing.

"I’m told that frankly, there were only minor changes in the security plan after Sept. 11 because the security plan was already that strong," Nash said. "There were certainly reviews of the security plan, but because it was in the works for so long and people were so thorough, it apparently required only very minor revisions."

GCNP rangers working at the Olympics will likely stay through the end of February, although Nash said it’s possible some will be released before the closing ceremonies.

Those attending the Games appear to be handling the security measures in stride.

"It’s certainly my sense from dealing with people here, that they expected a measure of inconvenience of getting around and to the games," he said. "I’ve not heard of any great surprises. People expected it to be difficult to get around."

Utilizing NPS employees at the Olympics makes sense, Nash said.

"With the great public lands we have, especially in the western United States, it’s just a natural role for us," Nash said. "We care for special places that have been saved by the American people. We also care for the people who care for those special places. When you look at the number of foreign visitors who come to place like this, we serve as a group who can help welcome them here."


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