Act Now to Support Preservation Funding

As many of you already know, federal funding for historic, cultural, and natural resources has never been in greater jeopardy.  As Congress works this summer to develop and pass its bills to fund the government for the 2012 fiscal year, we have already seen the elimination of valuable preservation programs such as Save America’s Treasures and Preserve America grants.  The picture does not look much brighter for many other federally funded programs that enhance protections for the places we cherish.

You can make a difference by letting your leaders in Congress know that reducing or eliminating funding for historic, cultural and natural resource programs comes with serious consequences.  The National Trust has joined forces with a coalition of national organizations supporting historic, natural, and recreational resourcesin addition to and the President’s plan for their stewardship called the “America’s Great Outdoors” initiative.  We would like to get as many organizations as we can to sign on to a support letter that will be delivered to the Congressional leadership next week.  The more organizations we have signing on to this letter, the greater our voice will be in calling attention to the importance of historic preservation and cultural resource protection in the federal budget.

If your organization would like to sign on to this letter, do so by noon on Friday, June 24^th.

For questions contact Patrick Lally, Acting Senior Director of Government Affairs, National Trust for Historic Preservation, at (202) 588-6129 or patrick_lally@nthp.org.

Be sure to check out Bonnie McDonald’s recent blog post “Preservation and the State Budget Agreement” and Minnesota History: Building A Legacy, Minnesota Historical Society’s 2011 report on the Legacy Funding.