Remembering a great public servant, Idaho Parks and Recreation director Yvonne Ferrell

When Yvonne Ferrell became the director of the Idaho Department of Parks and Recreation in 1987, she made one of her first speeches at a luncheon in Burley that attracted legislators, county commissioners and local tourism officials. The crowd almost certainly wanted to size up the new director, the only women in the United States at the time to run a state parks department.

Ferrell, who died recently at 84, didn’t disappoint. She told the story of her own journey from farm and ranch kid in Washington state where she joked “for years I thought recreation was spending time on a combine, riding horses or sewing a sack of grain in a few seconds” to one of the nation’s foremost advocates for parks and outdoor recreation. She had an unwavering commitment to ensuring that all Idahoans had access to quality parks and outdoor recreation.

To say that Ferrell, a straight-talking, no-nonsense public servant, was a trailblazer would hardly do honor to her remarkable career. She served in the job for 15 years before retiring in 2002. Former Governor Cecil D. Andrus, who both respected her ability and admired her tenacity, once said that if he had four Yvonne Ferrells he wouldn’t need any other state agency administrators. She was that good.

As Andrus’ chief of staff, I had the daily job of dealing with state agency directors. I cannot remember a single time I found myself worrying about the Parks Department under Yvonne Ferrell’s leadership. She was that good.

As the Parks and Recreation Department noted in a news release, “During her tenure the agency opened Dworshak, Land of the Yankee Fork, Glade Creek, Lake Walcott, Lake Cascade, Castle Rocks, and Coeur d’Alene Parkway state parks as well as the Ashton to Tetonia Trail, Trail of the Coeur d’Alenes, and Idaho’s border-to-border Centennial Trail. She oversaw the development of the observatory at Bruneau Dunes State Park and led the successful effort to acquire Lakeview Village and Camp Alice Pittenger, making them part of Ponderosa State Park. Under her leadership the department developed a system of rental yurts in the Idaho City area and began placing yurts and cabins in many Idaho state parks.”

Yvonne worked with the Idaho Shakespeare Festival and the Idaho Foundation for Parks and Lands to develop the festival’s marvelous outdoor theater site along the Boise River, just behind the headquarters building for the department. She was a consistent and effective advocate for federal support for the Land and Water Conservation Fund, a vital source of funding for local parks and recreation projects in Idaho and across the country.

In addition to the many new parks she helped establish, one of Yvonne’s greatest accomplishments was the creation of the Idaho Centennial Trail, the 900-mile Canada to Nevada trail that remains a lasting legacy of the centennial of statehood in 1990. The creation of the trail, and particularly its route, did not come easily. The initial preferred route, apparently because of less than creative thinking by federal land managers who worried about “overuse” of the trail, avoided the two incredible wilderness areas in the middle of Idaho, the Selway and the Frank Church. Not surprisingly conservationists objected.

After a meeting with trail advocates, as former Andrus aide Andy Brunelle recalled, “Yvonne put it back in the right place,” crossing the wilderness areas. “I remember when the meeting was over, she said ‘I have some work to do.’” And work she did. Ferrell quietly and effectively jawboned wilderness managers and did it, as Brunelle says, “in a way that didn’t leave bad feelings.”

The Idaho Parks board officially designated the trail on July 2, 1990, the day before the celebration of Idaho’s centennial.

In an age when it’s all too common to denigrate the public service and the expertise of government employees or diminish the role they play in providing a vast array of vital services to all of us, Yvonne Ferrell should be remembered as one of the very best. We can all enjoy the parks and trails she helped create, but she also mentored an entire generation of public servants who carried on in her spirit and that may be her lasting legacy.

Idaho is a better place because of her leadership.