Secretary of the interior in Donald Trump's administration. He oversees the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior, which planned to lay off 1,500 people in a "reduction in force".
Burgum ordered national parks to remain open despite staffing cuts and directed that closures of trails or campgrounds be reviewed by the department's top brass. He issued guidance that parks should play up "the greatness of the achievements and progress of the American people" and the "beauty, abundance, and grandeur of the American landscape". Signs or programmes mentioning slavery, racism, climate change or indigenous peoples who once lived on park lands may face scrutiny.
Burgum characterised the positions being cut as mostly "overhead" dealing with IT, finance and human resources. The regional-office roles he described as administrative also include researchers who collect weather, climate and species data for the parks' ecological health.
Flon's Law: There is not now, and never will be, a language in which it is the least bit difficult to write bad programs.