Opinion ID: 697364
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Considerations of Public Policy

Text: 11 Valdez argues alternatively that safety management concerns are not decisions based on considerations of public policy for purposes of the discretionary function exception. Gaubert, 499 U.S. at 323, 111 S.Ct. at 1274. He relies on a line of cases exemplified by Summers v. United States, 905 F.2d 1212 (9th Cir.1990). In Summers, this Court concluded that the NPS's failure to warn visitors of the potential danger of stepping on hot coals left by fire rings permitted on a public beach was not the type of judgment grounded in social, economic, or political policy that the discretionary function exception is intended to insulate. Id. at 1215. 12 We believe Valdez reads Summers too broadly. Our conclusion in Summers was based on the fact that there was no evidence ... that NPS's failure to post warnings ... was the result of a decision reflecting the competing considerations of the Service's sign policy. Id. We agree that  'where the challenged governmental activity involves safety considerations under an established policy, rather than the balancing of competing policy considerations, the rationale for the exception falls away and the U.S. will be responsible for the negligence of its employees.'  Id. (quoting ARA Leisure Services v. United States, 831 F.2d 193, 195 (9th Cir.1987)). Such is not the case here. 13 Here, the challenged conduct clearly implicates a choice between the competing policy considerations of maximizing access to and preservation of natural resources versus the need to minimize potential safety hazards. As we concluded in Childers, Park rangers used their discretion to balance, within the constraints of the resources available to them, a statutory mandate to provide access with the goal of public safety. This decision was precisely the kind the discretionary function exception was intended to immunize from suit. Childers, 40 F.3d at 976. We believe this logic is applicable to the case at hand. See also Lesoeur v. United States, 21 F.3d 965, 970 (9th Cir.1994). 14 The related decision regarding which natural hazards should be brought to the attention of the public through pamphlets or brochures similarly implicates public policy concerns. Faced with limited resources and unlimited natural hazards, the NPS must make a public policy determination of which dangers are obvious and which dangers merit the special focus of a warning brochure or pamphlet. In addition, too many warning brochures and pamphlets would inevitably reduce the impact of the individual warnings on the public. In this case, therefore, the NPS must balance the goal of public safety against competing fiscal concerns as well as the danger of an overproliferation of warnings.III. CONCLUSION 15 For the aforementioned reasons, we AFFIRM the order of the district court.