After serving as manager of Edgar Evins State Park for the last year and a half, Jacob Young has left to become manager of Fall Creek Falls State Park.
Young took over there last week. He and his family will be living at the ranger residence in the park.
In a phone interview with WJLE Thursday, Young said he had not planned to leave Edgar Evins State Park, but the position at Fall Creek Falls was offered to him when it became available and he felt it was an opportunity he could not pass up. “I wasn’t looking to leave. I absolutely love Edgar Evins State Park and I love the area. The staff became like family very quickly. I had just gotten back into Smithville and had gotten involved in a lot of things. We were also about to build a house so we weren’t planning on leaving but this opportunity came up quickly about a month ago. My wife and I talked about it and prayed about it. We felt like it was a good thing for my career, the kids, and the family. It was just a hard thing to turn down so we made the decision to leave,” said Young.
As a Park 3 Manager, Young will have more responsibilities at Fall Creek Falls and he will be supervisor to more than 100 employees as opposed to 20 employees at Edgar Evins State Park. Young also plans to make a variety of park improvements, just as he did here. “Coming to Fall Creek Falls, it’s a similar situation to what I found at Edgar Evins. There is a huge backlog of maintenance and millions of dollars worth of things that need to be done, whether it be cabins, restaurant, Inn, Ranger residences, signage in the park, etc. We have a lot of beautiful buildings here and the grounds look great but some of it is just in need of repair. One of the big projects on my radar is trying to get the signage updated. We have three or four capital projects including replacing our park office, our check-in station, and we may be rebuilding the Inn and restaurant in years to come. Lots of buildings need to be painted and we’re working on that right now. We’ve already got contractors coming. This is a busy park and state parks over the last couple of years have exploded in tourist activity. This park was more than $500,000 over on projected revenue last year,” he said.
Young is also proud of the improvements made at Edgar Evins State Park while he was there and expects more to follow. “When I arrived there were some things that needed to be done. I really wasn’t there for a long time. We reclaimed some of the areas where we had not been mowing for a while. We repainted a lot of buildings and the tower. We fixed the boat docks and got furnishings for the cabins and the work is still continuing. A lot of money will be coming to continue that into the campground and the shelter area,” said Young.
Park Ranger Mark Taylor currently serves as interim manager at Edgar Evins State Park. “They could open it (position) to lateral transfer meaning another park manager may transfer in or they may interview. If they interview there are candidates at the park who would be really good picks so one of those guys in house may step up in the Park Manager 2 position,” said Young.
A new manager is expected to be named by mid November or the first of December.
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