Had a great time Wednesday at an event at the Blue Ridge Parkway Offices near Asheville. Secretary of the Department of Interior Sally Jewell and Senator Richard Burr held a press conference and event to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Land and Water Conservation Fund. This fund is an American public lands success story. The Land and Water Conservation Fund has helped protect some of North Carolina’s most treasured places. North Carolina has received approximately $227 million over the past four decades, protecting places such as the Cape Hatteras National Seashore and the Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge.and many public lands in Western North Carolina. The money for this fund comes from a tiny portion of the revenue the government gets from off shore oil drilling, not tax dollars. Its supposed to get $900 million dollars a year in funding but Congress has only funded it at full funding one year in its history. Senator Burr is co sponsoring a bill that would require full, dedicated funding each year which would take away Congressional discretion to raid the fund. Senator Hagan is also signed onto the Bill. It was gratifying to see a very conservative Senator on the stage with a department secretary from the Obama administration in agreement on reauthorizing this terrific program and pushing it to full, dedicated funding. Its a tribute to the sportsmen, conservation and land trust community that we have given voice to the need to protect and preserve the special places in America. It makes sense to take these actions not only because we have a moral obligation to our children to protect public lands, love to hunt, fish, hike, camp and observe wildlife on these public lands but because these pursuits contributes $19 billion to North Carolinas economy yearly and produces 192,000 jobs. This action is a no brainer. Kudos to Secretary Jewell, Senator Burr and Senator Hagan for working to protect our outdoor heritage. Unfortunately there are those in Congress who oppose public lands protections. The conservation community and these public lands legislative champions have a lot of work to do to insure re authorization of the LWCF at the level it was intended to be funded at and to make the funding dedicated. Leaders from the entire community turned out to voice support for this effort.
Posted on: Fri, 08 Aug 2014 19:09:55 +0000
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