Michigan’s state park system has been a source of pride for generations. From the wilderness of the Upper Peninsula to the spectacular shorelines of the Great Lakes to close-at-hand recreation areas such as Fort Custer and Yankee Springs, we’ve been blessed with an abundance of acreage for camping, hiking, fishing and other outdoor pursuits.

But that abundance also can be a burden when it comes to paying to properly maintain the state’s 98 parks and recreation areas.

For at least the past five years, the Department of Natural Resources has been stretching a bare-bones budget to pay for little but the most necessary of repairs and upkeep. The department has a list of more than 300 park improvement projects it would like to undertake as soon as possible. But it lacks the approximately $200 million required to fund the list. In fact, the DNR currently is allocating only $2 million a year for infrastructure and major preventive maintenance – most of which must be devoted to emergency situations like sewer and bridge repairs.

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Michigan’s state parks have more than $200 million worth of failing water and sewer systems, dilapidated buildings and deteriorating roads and bridges.

But don’t expect a lot of those repairs to be paid for with federal stimulus money. Two weeks after President Barack Obama signed the $787 billion federal stimulus package into law, it’s evident few of those projects will get done.

Instead, the beleaguered state Department of Natural Resources again will postpone most of the projects and focus on a few must-do repairs, such as fixing a bridge at the heavily used Warren Dunes State Park so visitors don’t have to park near the park entrance and walk nearly a mile to the beach.

“We were hoping to get some federal stimulus money, because that’s a shovel-ready project. But it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen,” Ron Olson, DNR chief of parks and recreation, told The Associated Press.

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