Voting to not change the names of iconic Yosemite landmarks only supports the protagonist

We should have stopped this a decade ago, it’s too late now.

The facts are sort of simple understanding the law relating to the issue is confusing.

Delaware North was a concessionaire running the Yosemite National Park concession. Delaware North like a lot of concessionaires had to purchase the assets of the prior owner of the concession in 1993. That purchase included a lot of trademarks including the ones at issue here.

Allegedly the National Park Service decades ago required concessionaires to trademark the famous names in their concession. Anyone taking over a concession must purchase the assets of the prior concessionaire. This issue is determining the value of those assets which include the trademarks on the valuable names.

Anyone using a trademark must do so with the permission (that means pay money) of the owner of the trademark. If the NPS wants to use the name Ahwahnee then they must pay Delaware North money.

Delaware North lost the concession agreement with the National Park Service (NPS).

Delaware North has spent the time since the loss of the concession trying to get the NPS to determine a value of the assets to be sold to the new concessionaire. When the NPS would not agree to the values or arbitrate the issues Delaware North then sued the National Park Service for violation of its trademarks. Delaware North says the trademark is worth $51 million basically.

Congress cannot do anything. Congress cannot take away a legally obtained trademark. A trademark is a property right. It is something that is owned like land, a car, and your clothes. For congress to take away someone’s trademark would be like someone from the government coming and taking your car. They can’t unless you have committed a crime with your car. Here no crime has been committed that I have read about.

It is simple. Either we, the United States can pay Delaware North a lot of money to continue to use the names of the properties or we sue and lose and spend a lot of money on attorney fees and then pay Delaware North money. Probably the NPS (us) will be paying Delaware North into eternity if we sue. Delaware North would get a license fee every year, damages for prior use, interests, costs and attorney fees.

And if not Delaware North, then the next concessionaire and the next……

Congress cannot do anything. It is very rare for (Congress to do anything) take away someone’s ownership right absent a crime. So far no one has found a crime in this mess. On top of that I seriously doubt congress would do anything about it.

Your signature on Petitions, online comments etc., are ONLY helping Delaware North.

Every time there is another signature, comment etc., it just goes to prove the value of the trademark and increases the amount of money owed to Delaware North.

If you want to help solve the problem QUIT talking about this issue.

By changing the names to the landmarks the NPS might be able to reduce the value of the Trademarks to a reasonable value. Then the US can either buy the trademark names back (again will require an act of congress I think) or not worry about it.

Another alternative is for us to wait until the value drops and raise the money and buy the landmarks back ourselves.

Either way it is going to be a long and expensive process. There is nothing you or I can do about this now.

The irony of the issue is decades ago the NPS required the concessionaire to trademark the valuable names. Now the NPS is arguing the names can’t be trademarked because they have historical value.

This is a great article about the issues:

Yosemite Concessionaire has offered National Park Service free use of Yosemite trademark names during legal dispute

Another article that is worth reading:

Yosemite changes names of park sites as a result of trademark dispute

What do you think? Leave a comment.

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