May 2012 - Parks & Recreation - 26

aDvoCaCY uPDatE continued from page 23

along with our walking and biking advocacy
partners, NRPA will continue meeting with
House oﬃces to demonstrate why dedicated
funding for walking and biking (including TE, RTP,
and safe Routes to school) is important and to
urge them to either pass maP-21 or to amend their
bill to include support for these critical programs.

Parks & Recreation M A Y

The House is expected to decide prior
to May 1 whether to bring its 5-year, $260
billion bill to the floor (which, again, eliminates TE and Safe Routes to School) or pare
it down to be more in line with the Senatepassed 2-year, $109 billion bill (MAP-21).
Or, Congress may elect to take a pass on
getting new legislation completed this year
and further extend existing law until sometime after the November elections.
The latter further undermines national transportation programs by not only
adding to the uncertainty over continued
funding many states and localities currently experience when planning transportation projects. But also, by the fact
that, based upon our nation's reduced
consumption of gasoline and the revenues
it generates through the federal gas tax,
the Highway Trust Fund is expected to be
completely exhausted sometime in 2013.

Potential Impact for LWCF
Through a series of unrelated but (frankly) extraordinary events, the future of
the LWCF may be impacted by whatever Congress ultimately decides to do on
transportation. The House and Senate
bills, fittingly, take very different views
on issues related to funding for the LWCF.
The Senate-passed bill (MAP-21) would
provide $700 million each year in FY 2013
and FY 2014 to the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). The bill also
would reauthorize the LWCF program
from FY 2015 through FY 2022, but that
funding would be subject to annual appropriations. There is no similar provision in
the current House bill (HR 7). In fact, the
House approved a major increase in federal energy exploration and development with the " revenues " generated from
such activities as the primary source of

2 0 1 2 w w w . N R P A . O R G

funding for their five-year bill. These dollars are currently the " dedicated " source
of funding for the LWCF as well as other
programs intended to promote conservation. This major change in policy to one
directly attaching energy production to
infrastructure (now referred to by many
as " Drill to Drive " ) puts future funding for
critical programs like LWCF at risk.
Further, the Senate LWCF provision is
likely to draw opposition in the House.
Western Republicans view LWCF as primarily a federal land acquisition program
and have recommended limiting new
projects until existing maintenance backlogs are cleared. However, the LWCF
State Assistance Program is the only dedicated funding available for state and local parks to provide outdoor recreation.

The Road Ahead
So, what happens next? Congress has
bought itself until July to break their impasse and pass a new transportation
bill. Democrats will push the House to
pass MAP-21. And House leadership will
keep working to secure the votes needed to bring HR 7 (or something similar)
to the floor.
We urge you to use this time to influence how your representative votes as
well. Along with our walking and biking
advocacy partners, NRPA will continue
meeting with House offices to demonstrate why dedicated funding for walking
and biking (including TE, RTP, and Safe
Routes to School) is important and to urge
them to either pass MAP-21 or to amend
their bill to include support for these critical programs.
Dave tYaHla is NRPA Senior

Government Aﬀairs Manager.

thinkstOck

However, to have any legislation (including surface transportation reauthorization) signed into law, both chambers of
Congress must act. The House has tried
several times to bring up its fi ve-year
transportation bill (HR 7), and each time
has been unable to muster enough votes
to pass it. The House bill would eliminate
Safe Routes to School and remove annual guaranteed funding for TE, thus forcing these active transportation options to
compete with other programs for limited
money.
NRPA hosted our 2012 National Legislative Forum in Washington, DC, from
March 27th through the 29th. Armed
with legislative background and the anecdotes and data explaining how these
programs benefit their local communities, over 300 NRPA members took full
advantage of the opportune timing of
their Capitol Hill visits to thank senators
for improving and passing MAP-21, and
to urge their representatives to restore
dedicated funding for bicycling and
walking whenever the House takes up
the surface transportation bill.
House and Senate Democrats pushed
House Republicans to simply take up and
pass MAP-21 and bring an end to the
more than two years of delay in reauthorizing federal transportation law. House
leadership resisted but, faced with federal transportation funding stopping on
April 1-along with existing infrastructure projects and the hundreds of thousands of jobs directly tied to them-and
after several delays and false starts, approved the latest 90-day extension. The
Senate ultimately acquiesced on their demands for the House to vote, up or down,
on MAP-21 prior to the end of March and
agreed to this latest extension.

May 2012 - Parks & Recreation

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of May 2012 - Parks & Recreation