The historic Crater Lake Lodge, inside Crater Lake National Park, was built in 1915 and today offers 71 rooms, a restaurant and lakeside views. 

Sen. Ron Wyden issued a series of accusations against the company running facilities at Crater Lake National Park, calling for the National Park Service to review the concessionaire’s contract.

In a blistering letter to Charles F. “Chuck” Sams III, director of the National Park Service, Sen. Wyden accused the concessionaire, Aramark, of a litany of “serious concerns” at the park, including unsafe housing conditions for park staff, unreported diesel spills, unsanitary conditions in the park’s restaurant and poorly maintained fire alarms.

“I am alarmed by the serious failure of the concessionaire to fulfill its responsibility to provide these services and the resulting harm to public safety, visitor experience and the irreplaceable resources in and around the park,” Wyden wrote. “Given the severity of these failings and the important role of the agency in holding concessionaires accountable, I ask that the National Park Service take immediate action to prevent concessionaire mismanagement from continuing to threaten Crater Lake National Park, its visitors, or the employees who live and work there.”

Dated Friday, Dec. 8, the letter was made public Monday after Wyden circulated it to the media and posted it online.

Aramark, an international hospitality company based in Philadelphia that is contracted to operate park facilities under a subsidiary, Crater Lake Hospitality, responded to the allegations Tuesday, saying the company has been actively working on improvements to operations at the park, including recent upgrades to cabins, refreshed lodge rooms, renovations at Rim Village and new eco-friendly boats for scenic tours on the lake.

“We take these concerns very seriously, and the examples provided are not reflective of Aramark’s standards,” an email from the company said. “Additional investments are planned to address other important aspects of our operations, and we will continue to work closely with the National Park Service to improve the staff and visitor experience.”

The National Park Service did not respond to requests for comment.

Oregon’s only full-fledged national park, Crater Lake draws hundreds of thousands of visitors each year. Overnight travelers can stay in the historic Crater Lake Lodge, the Cabins at Mazama Village or the Mazama Campground — all of which are run by Aramark.

Crater Lake Hospitality was selected as the concessionaire at Crater Lake National Park in 2018, replacing Xanterra Parks and Resorts, which operated in the park for 15 years. The 10-year contract for the operation of lodging, food service, retail and boat tours was extended to 2030, due to disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic, Wyden’s office said.

The contract with Crater Lake Hospitality included management of facilities at the Oregon Caves National Monument & Preserve in southern Oregon. That includes the historic Oregon Caves Chateau, which closed in 2018 for repairs but has yet to reopen.

Wyden said park assessments of Crater Lake Lodging “make it clear that the concessionaire has continually failed to fulfill the requirements of the contract,” and that despite repeated attempts to turn things around, “it is clear that little progress has been achieved to meaningfully resolve most of these serious issues.”

After becoming aware of the issues, Wyden said he directed his staff to conduct an in-person assessment of the park’s facilities on Nov. 17, which validated his concerns. It was only through the efforts of dedicated park staff, he said, that the situation did not become significantly worse.

The senator’s staff said they witnessed employee housing in a state of disrepair, including rooms without working heaters or adequate security measures. Wyden said the National Park Service has reported “serious assaults and other criminal activity” in the dorms, making safety issues paramount.

Safety issues extended to the park’s other facilities, including malfunctioning fire alarms and unsatisfactory public health inspections at the Crater Lake Lodge Restaurant, Wyden wrote. He also accused the concessionaire of failing to provide the National Park Service with documentation that kitchen staff have received proper food safety certifications.

Aramark’s violations extended to environmental violations, Wyden wrote, after allegedly failing to properly handle at least three diesel spills at park facilities in 2023. In one case, staff did not respond to a spill in a timely manner, and failed to report the incident to the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, Wyden wrote.

All of those complaints come on top of the general maintenance issues at park facilities, work that Wyden said has completely stalled.

Park officials at Crater Lake have long acknowledged the maintenance backlog in the park. Increasing entrance fees – from $5 to $30 between 2015 and 2020 – were meant to fund some of those maintenance projects, though dwindling crowds in recent years may have meant less money than expected.

Some projects were sidelined by the pandemic in 2020, which shuttered several of the park’s facilities for over a year. In that time, the park reported staffing levels 60% to 70% below normal due to housing shortages, as a number of stressors began to build up, including an increase in rescues and illegal items that threatened the pristine waters of the lake.

Still, some maintenance projects are coming along. In July, the park shut down part of Rim Drive, which circumnavigates the lake, in order to execute a $56 million road repair project, utilizing funds from the Great American Outdoors Act, passed in 2020.

Wyden’s letter recognized the road project as an example of the National Park Service’s dedication to addressing safety issues at Crater Lake. His ire was directed squarely at Aramark, which he said hasn’t done enough to address the issues it’s responsible for.

In his letter, he said the hospitality company has failed to execute a number of maintenance and improvement projects that it is contractually obligated to complete.

“As a result of this lack of investment and a continued failure to protect their workers and act as proper stewards of our public lands, I strongly urge the National Parks Service to take immediate action to make sure the contract is upheld or consider if a new contract might be more appropriate,” Wyden wrote.