Delaware Water Gap National Park Petition Reignites Controversy

By Lauren Jessop | The Center Square contributor Delaware River National Park and Lenape Preserve, The Center Square New Jersey

April 13, 2023

(The Center Square) – A new effort to redesignate the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area as a national park and preserve has reignited old controversies among property owners wary of further government intrusion.

Facing off on the issue are the Delaware River National Park & Lenape Preserve Alliance – who is spearheading the congressional petition for the redesignation – and the Delaware Water Gap Defense Fund, also known as No National Park, who feel the area’s current status is satisfactory.

Bob Fitch, media liaison for the Lenape Preserve Alliance, says it wants to place “this gem of our national heritage into the jeweled crown of the national park system where it has always belonged,” enhancing its protection and prestige.

The recreation area spans 70,000 acres along a 40-mile stretch of the Delaware River, from northeastern Pennsylvania to the western edge of the Kittatinny Mountains in New Jersey’s Warren and Sussex counties. At the time of its original designation, it did not fit the characteristics of a national park.

The petition calls for 9,760 acres – 14% of the area – to become a national park, the majority of which surrounds the river. Over 56,000 acres would become a preserve on which hunting would be allowed.

Delaware River National Park and Lenape Preserve

No National Park worries, however, that doing so will increase traffic, damage infrastructure in the park and surrounding communities, cost too much money, restrict hunting and farming, and lose more property through eminent domain.

The group’s concerns stem from historical precedent – the memory of which causes locals like Sandy Hull, who heads the nonprofit Delaware Water Gap Defense Fund, to fear property will again be seized by the federal government.

Hull was involved in a decades-old fight to stop another federal project –the Tocks Island Dam – that saw properties taken and centuries of family history erased.

The dam was proposed after flooding in the Poconos Mountains killed nearly 100 people in 1955. In response, the Army Corps of Engineers planned to build reservoirs and dams along the Delaware River to alleviate the issue.

The project was scrapped in 1975, but only after 600 property owners – some whose families had lived there for hundreds of years – lost their land to eminent domain. The seized property was eventually transferred to the National Parks Service.

Fitch said he understands the community’s wariness, but stressed the petition stipulates that only properties offered through “willing sellers” will be considered.

On concerns about farmers who lease land along the river to produce crops, Fitch said that since they are “no-tillage” acres, it may still be allowed, but federal rules on chemicals and pesticides must be followed.

The petition also proposes no additional fees, Fitch said, though ultimately the National Park Service would make the final call. Out of 424 parks in the system, only one-quarter charge entrance fees.

Hull said she’s still skeptical and wants more information on the purported benefits of the redesignation.

“The point is, a group of people who see something isn’t right came together,” she said. “We gave them a voice, and now they’re speaking up.”

The petition models the New River Gorge National Park and Preserve in West Virginia, which has similar characteristics and was redesignated in 2021.

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