Partnership For The National Trails System

Programs: The partnership strengthened the capacity of the member trail organizations by facilitating communication and information exchange among organization leaders and federal agency staff through a quarterly publication of the magazine "pathways across america, distributing a monthly e-news, and hosting a website with informational and educational materials and links to the agencies and member organizations. The partnership provided monthly educational webinars on various topics pertinent to protecting, interpreting, and maintaining national trails. The partnership also began planning with the river management society for two co-located conferences to be held in october 2018 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the national trails system and the national wild and scenic rivers system.

the partnership continued to promote the "decade for the nationaltrails" by pursuing a number of actions to implement the three decade goals and a series of objectives to greatly increase public support for the national trails system, to complete more of the trails, and to strengthen the capacity of the organizations and federal agencies to sustain them. Among these actions the partnership convened collaborative work with the american hiking society, american trails, and the rails-to-trails conservancy to plan activities, events, programs, awareness building communications and policy initiatives to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the national trails system during 2018. This work also involved collaboration with the wild and scenic rivers organizations and staff from the national park service, bureau of land management, u. S. Forest service, and u. S. Fish & wildlife service. Through this collaboration we developed a special website - trails50. Org - to provide information about the 50th anniversary. The partnership also continued the youth outreach program begun in 2009 with federal funding by providing grants to 20 of the national trail partnerships to fund young trail interns to work on projects, programs, and activities determined to be priorities by each trail partnership. The partnership also worked with federal agency partners and member trail organizations to develop a list and description of projects for land and water conservation fund funding to acquire critical land to close gaps and preserve important natural and cultural resources along 12 of the 10,431 national scenic and historic trails for inclusion in the president's fiscal year 2018 budget.

the partnership provided annual reports and information to congress and federal trail managing agencies about the state of the trails and contributions, projects, and activities of our member organizations towards sustaining the national scenic and historic trails. The partnership also provided information to congress about the funding needed to sustain and increase activities underway to acquire land and to construct, maintain, interpret, and manage the scenic and historic trails through written testimony provided to the house and senate interior appropriations subcommittees. The partnership participated with dozens of other conservation organizations in coalitions urging congress to pass legislation to reauthorize and fully fund the land and water conservation fund; reauthorize the federal land transfer facilitation act; and reauthorize the federal transportation program to continue the recreational trails funding program and other programs funding development and maintenance of local, regional, and national trails. During 2017 the partnership compiled an annual report which it shared with congress and federal agency staff documenting that during 2016 the 35 member organizations of the partnership had organized and guided tens of thousands of citizen volunteers who contributed at least 1,029,569 hours of labor to help sustain the 30 national scenic and historic trails. The value of this donated labor and the financial contributions made by the nonprofit trail organizations totaled more than $37. 4 million -- 1/3rd more than congress appropriated for the national park service, u. S. Forest service, and bureau of land management to manage and maintain these national trails.

the partnership continued to encourage the u. S. Department of the interior bureau of land management and the u. S. Forest service (usfs) to adopt special management corridors to guide land use planning and management for the scenic and historic trails. We emphasized this management approach through comments on planning for solar energy projects on public lands adjacent to the national landscape conservation system and in comments on several proposed revisions to area land management plans within the blm. The partnership also promoted this corridor management approach in comments provided to the usfs regarding proposed land management plans for several national forests along the continental divide national scenic trail. The partnership continued to encourage the national park service to give greater recognition of national scenic and historic trails in the national park system. The partnership continued to monitor development of the u. S. Forest service's revised saw use policy for standardizing procedures for safe use of chainsaws and crosscut saws by volunteers and staff on all national forests throughout the country, which was promulgated in late 2016. The partnership also participated in several meetings organized by the u. S. Forest service to develop a national strategy for sustainably maintaining the 155,000 miles of trails in the national forests. The partnership submitted formal comments regarding the proposal by the national park service to increase entrance fees to the national parks, to the bureau of land management regarding a proposal to shorten the public comment period for nepa review projects, and to the department of the interior regarding the proposed reduction of the areas of a number of the national monuments administered by the bureau of land management.