Campground Bear Safety Educator(s)

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Volunteers provide valuable information to campers about camping safely in grizzly bear country!

Specifically, volunteers walk through assigned campgrounds (about 200 campsites total) every late Friday afternoon and Saturday from July Fourth through Labor Day Weekends. When campers are present, volunteers educate campers about required bear attractant storage. When campers are not present, volunteers leave award certificates for bear-safe camps or informative checklists for bear-unsafe camps. Volunteers also establish working relationships with campground hosts and legibly fill out datasheets for each campground. There is a one-hour training session conducted the last week of June.

Volunteers drive approximately 100 miles each week to campgrounds on paved county roads or highways in their own vehicles. There is not enough funding to compensate volunteers for mileage, so past volunteers have deducted the mileage on their tax forms.

A free RV pad is available at beautiful Mesa Falls near the visitor center and public parking area. The site has electricity, water, and sewer; but does not have cell or satellite service . The nearest cell service is three miles north or south of the RV site on the paved Mesa Falls Byway. Volunteers in 2024 used Starlink at the RV sites and were able to call out and use the internet successfully. Mosquitoes are a bit intense early in the summer, but non-existent during the hottest part of the summer.

In summary, the advantages of this opportunity are that volunteers only work 1.5 days per week (about eight to 10 hours total) for only 10 weeks and have a beautiful RV site in the Greater Yellowstone Area. The disadvantages of this opportunity are that volunteers must drive many miles each week in their own vehicles and there is no cell or internet service at the RV site without Starlink.

If you are interested in this opportunity, please contact me directly as I do not have access to the volunteer.gov website and applications. Please send an interest statement and any other relevant information to sabrina.derusseau@usda.gov .

Thank you!

Start Date - 2025-06-23

End Date - 2025-09-02