Our View: The full cost of the Yosemite shakedown

No, those Yosemite landmarks won’t disappear next week. But their names might.

That’s because, starting March 1, names including Ahwahnee, Curry Village and Wawona will all officially change so as not to violate trademark laws. We won’t bother providing the National Parks Service’s new names. We don’t like them. But if the NPS uses the current ones, they might be liable in a lawsuit. So, for the time being, the park service will drape canvas over the signs, hiding them from view.

This arises from a dispute with Yosemite’s former concessionaire, New York-based Delaware North. After a new concessionaire outbid the company, Delaware North demanded $51 million for the intellectual property attached to the place names. A generation ago, the park service had requested a previous concessionaire trademark the names and then turn over the trademarks to the government. The first part happened, the second didn’t. Instead they were passed along to other concessionaires.

It didn’t become an issue until Delaware North lost its bid and grew petulant. Yes, the firm insists it’s OK to continue using the names, but the park service is distrustful of such promises.

This has been going on for a few months, and most people are both aware and outraged. What you might not know is that some California legislators are trying to make sure it never happens to California’s beloved place names. Assembly members Ken Cooley, D-Rancho Cordova, Adam Gray, D-Merced, Frank Bigelow, R-O’Neals, and Kristin Olsen, R-Riverbank, have co-authored a bill that would prohibit any vendor from trademarking California state park names.

It’s unfortunate they all feel it necessary to take such preventive action. But the place names in Yosemite aren’t the only ones precious to us. Assembly Bill 2249 should guarantee that Big Trees, Angel Island, Hearst Castle, Castle Crags or even Henry Coe cannot be trademarked by anyone selling sodas and candy bars.

There might be an easier way. These are, after all, public parks. Perhaps every park name should be made part of the public domain once officially established.

Still, it’s hard to imagine a company would be so obsessed with a one-off payday that it would forgo the chance to ever again do business on public land in California. But the bill should remind Delaware North of the full cost of such a decision.

There are names for companies that pull such stunts, and we won’t print them. Just as we’ll refrain, for now, from calling the gems of the national park system by those other, less majestic names they’ve been assigned.

This story was originally published February 26, 2016 at 3:16 PM with the headline "Our View: The full cost of the Yosemite shakedown."