GAOA was funded through energy royalties, so tying its replacement to the IRA's 16.67% onshore rate (and closing the offshore gap that still sits at 12.5% on legacy leases) would create a direct pipeline. The $12B backlog jump in one fiscal year already exceeds NPS's entire annual budget, so staffing alone can't catch up.
When I was in the Army Reserves, my unit was really close to a national forest. We tried to help them out by maintaining an ATV trail but our battalion stopped us from doing it for stupid reasons. We were an engineer unit with heavy construction equipment and could have helped them out but our battalion didn't like us doing our jobs on drill weekends. They thought we should stay at our unit and do classes or something. Bad leadership.
There's many military national guard and reserve units that could help them out; some national guard units get to. It's good training and helping to maintain parks is a direct way to help people in our country.
What your battalion blocked has a name: Innovative Readiness Training. DoD has authorized it since the 1990s, with engineering units getting real-world reps building clinics, roads, and trails on public and tribal land. Your leadership turned down a sanctioned mission to run drill-hall classes instead.
Happy Earth Day. Thank you for this sobering accounting of how our money could be infinitely better spent than by being wasted in an illegal and unwanted war of harm, fraud, abuse, inefficiency, and did I mention murder?
FY27 budget is now in progress, as you noted. Last year, Congress funded agencies that Trump slashed, so...what should we ask for?
(1) Public lands need to be safe.
(2) Public lands generate revenue for recreation.
(3) We understand Trump/Burgum/etc. end game. (Why else would they want to hire Steve Pearce and Scott Socha?)
(4) Public lands need real funding, including maintenance and replacing lost staff.
* The GAOA has expired. Replace or extend it. But put in more money, much more money.
* Expand LWCF to include maintenance? Increase royalties, given the obscene profits of oil/gas?
* Good idea below about National Guard and Reserve units.
* Hire staff.
* What else?
Americans raised a ruckus and saved public lands from the OBBA. What can we do this time?
GAOA was funded through energy royalties, so tying its replacement to the IRA's 16.67% onshore rate (and closing the offshore gap that still sits at 12.5% on legacy leases) would create a direct pipeline. The $12B backlog jump in one fiscal year already exceeds NPS's entire annual budget, so staffing alone can't catch up.
An abomination!
When I was in the Army Reserves, my unit was really close to a national forest. We tried to help them out by maintaining an ATV trail but our battalion stopped us from doing it for stupid reasons. We were an engineer unit with heavy construction equipment and could have helped them out but our battalion didn't like us doing our jobs on drill weekends. They thought we should stay at our unit and do classes or something. Bad leadership.
There's many military national guard and reserve units that could help them out; some national guard units get to. It's good training and helping to maintain parks is a direct way to help people in our country.
What your battalion blocked has a name: Innovative Readiness Training. DoD has authorized it since the 1990s, with engineering units getting real-world reps building clinics, roads, and trails on public and tribal land. Your leadership turned down a sanctioned mission to run drill-hall classes instead.
Happy Earth Day. Thank you for this sobering accounting of how our money could be infinitely better spent than by being wasted in an illegal and unwanted war of harm, fraud, abuse, inefficiency, and did I mention murder?
Thanks for your Substack. The attack on America’s wild lands by the T administration is absolutely sickening!
We have these amazing gifts from Mother Earth and they literally shit all over them.
They'd shit on their grandmothers if they thought there were short term profits to be gained