With the Land and Water Conservation Fund in danger of expiration, National parks still need money. Utah Congressman Rob Bishop (R-Ut-1) and Raul Grijalva (D- AZ-3 ) have co-sponsored a bi-partisan bill to cope with the deferred maintenance backlog at America’s national parks. The “National Park Service and Public Lands Legacy Restoration Act” would use money from public lands energy leasing to pay for the public lands maintenance backlog. The catch is, unlike LWCF, none of the money could be used to purchase new recreational lands. This presents a problem when, for example, private land owners threaten to develop inholdings or when private lands block public access to recreation. It’s good to fund public lands maintenance, but this bill does not adequately replace LWCF.
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