Our Stories
NCTA wins National Park Service volunteer group award!
At the recent annual conference in Ashland, WI the NCTA was recognized as the National Park Service Midwest Region’s Hartzog Award winner for the Outstanding Volunteer Group category for 2009. We were nominated by Dan Watson who serves as the NPS’ Volunteer Coordinator for the North Country and Ice Age National Scenic Trails. Dan is a very good nomination writer – in addition to the NCTA’s selection, the Ice Age Trail Alliance also won the Regional and National awards in 2008. The NCTA was selected over volunteer groups affiliated with the 23 other Parks in the NPS’ Midwest Region. This prestigious award is named for former NPS Director George Hartzog Jr. who once wrote…
“When a VIP agrees to share his talents, skills and interests with the National Park Service, he is paying us one of the highest compliments possible by offering a most valued possession – his time.”
George B. Hartzog, Jr. made this statement on November 17, 1970 in a letter to all regional directors announcing the
new Volunteers-In-Parks program. Director Hartzog led the National Park Service from 1964 to 1972. During his tenure, 70 sites were added to the National Park System and he championed historic preservation, urban recreation, interpretation and environmental education. Director Hartzog recognized the need to make it easier for citizens to donate, without compensation, their time and talents to the NPS and pushed through legislation creating the Volunteers-In-Parks Program.
After his retirement, George and his wife Helen remembered the VIP program with a generous donation to the National Park Foundation. This fund has been used to support awards that honor the efforts of exceptional volunteers, groups, and park VIP programs.
Award Purpose and Description
The NPS created these awards to honor volunteers’ hard work, draw attention to their vast skills and contributions, and to stimulate development of innovative projects and volunteer involvement. The intent of the awards is to distinguish those individuals or groups who give of their skills, talents, and time beyond the normal call of duty. They are not awarded based solely on length of service.
There are five awards. The Hartzog Volunteer Group Award recognizes contributions by an organized group. Here is what Dan wrote in his NCTA nomination…
“The volunteers of the NCTA are organized across the length of the North Country NST by a series of 37 local trail “Chapters” and ‘Trail Maintaining Affiliates.’ It is this cadre of volunteers who lace up work boots, shoulder supplies and tools, and carry out the real work of putting trail tread on the ground for the enjoyment of the public.
Trail construction and maintenance is accomplished through the NCTA Chapters; each individual project becoming another piece of the overall tapestry of the trail mosaic. It is intriguing to witness how seemingly isolated and unrelated efforts in each Chapter’s annual work plan somehow knit together with every other Chapter’s accomplishments, and little by little, mile by mile, combine to produce the whole. It does not happen by luck or chance, but because the NCTA faces each day with the vision of teamwork and communication toward a common goal. In FY09, the North Country NST saw an additional 20 miles of completed trail receiving official NPS certification, with hundreds of other existing trail miles receiving maintenance attention.
In FY 2009, 784 volunteers tallied a remarkable 59,958 hours of VIP service to the North Country NST. This represents a very impressive increase in volunteer numbers of 18% over FY08, and an equally impressive increase in volunteer hours of 22% over FY 08. Accordingly, these statistics for FY 2009 represent a private sector value of an astounding $1,214,149.50. “
For more information on volunteering on the NCT, visit the NCTA’s website or contact the NCTA.