The Obama Administration’s dire warnings about the impact of the automatic sequester cuts have failed to live up to expectations. That hasn’t prevented them, however, from making dramatic and very public cuts to increase their effect. Canceling public tours of the White House during the busy tourist season is the highest profile of these cuts. Breitbart News as learned that the National Park Service has also scaled back public tours of the memorials at Pearl Harbor.
Effective Wednesday March 6, 2013, the last public tour to the USS Arizona Memorial will be offered at 1:00 P.M. as opposed to 3:00 P.M. Regular program tours to the USS Arizona Memorial will take place from 8:00 A.M. to 1:00 P.M. and daily tickets remain available for those time frames on Recreation.gov in addition to tickets that are available for walk-in visitors on site.
The Pearl Harbor Visitor Center hours of operation will be between 7:00 A.M. to 4:30 P.M. as opposed to 5:00 P.M. The book store, snack shop, museums and audio tours remain available during visitor center hours. Access to the USS Bowfin Submarine, Pacific Aviation Museum and the USS Missouri Memorial will not be impacted. Please take this opportunity to take advantage of Passport to Pearl Harbor through Recreation.gov.
At least the Park Service still allows some tours of the historic landmark. Still, it begs the question of how a need to trim pennies from a federal dollar necessitates such a move. The Park Service manages 7 national parks in Hawaii. No other park in the state has any restrictions or cutbacks due to the sequester cuts. Only the park on hallowed ground.
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