Leaders of the national trails community circulated this week a letter to congressional appropriators thanking them for avoiding cuts to federal agency trails budgets when they (finally!) approved Fiscal Year 2024 spending levels. It remains a difficult funding climate and Congress made across-the-board cuts to the budgets of all federal land management agencies. Nonetheless, BCHA and its partners chose to celebrate this success, which should mean that agency trail budgets also remain intact throughout Fiscal Year 2025. This victory was the result of persistent efforts by the national trails community over the year, including last month’s Hike the Hill® event in Washington, DC, when BCHA and partners met with congressional appropriations staff. For nearly a decade, BCHA has worked side-by-side
with trail partners across the spectrum (i.e., hike, bike, horse and motorized) to develop and submit each year detailed funding recommendations to Congress related to recreation and trails for each of the federal land management agencies. Those requests have been well received and BCHA and its partners enjoy excellent working relations with congressional appropriations staff. BCHA recognizes that trails and public lands continue not to receive levels of funding needed to fulfill agency staffing, conservation, and maintenance mandates. As mentioned in this week’s letter, the trails community “remains dedicated to supporting robust funding for federal land management agencies going forward and ensuring that conservation and recreation receives the funding it desperately needs and deserves.” This includes seeking yet additional funding for the agencies so they can fill long-vacant positions at the local level (e.g., Forest Service ranger district, BLM field office, etc.), if not expand existing staffing levels, in order to support and facilitate the work of volunteers and partners in our tasks related to trail maintenance, saw certification, ecological restoration, and the development of volunteer and cost-share agreements. BCHA will continue to engage its members as we work with partners in developing future appropriation requests to Congress, including those related to the compelling need to enhance the trails-related workforce among the agencies. Stay tuned for additional news on this topic, including the results of the US Forest Service’s newly-released Trails Workforce Capacity Analysis—the results of which were revealed during last month’s Hike the Hill® event. We Mark Himmel and the Chief of
Forest Service expect to arrange a webinar in the next few months for BCHA and members on this important topic. Please join me in celebrating this modest trail funding victory, with the hope of more such victories to celebrate in the near future!
Until then,
Randy Rasmussen
BCHA Director, Public Lands & Recreation