The Great American Outdoors Act: A Tool to Advance Public Health
July 24, 2024
Overview
Passed in 2020, the Great American Outdoors Act serves as a legal and funding tool to assist with initiatives to provide more green space for residents in rural and urban communities. The Outdoors for All Act, currently awaiting Senate approval, would expand on this progress by increasing access to parks and green spaces in low-income communities and communities of color.
Protecting our country’s public lands has immense public health benefits. The Great American Outdoors Act passed with a wide bipartisan majority in 2020 and has made strides in the conservation and expansion of public lands and green spaces in the United States. The legislation addresses maintenance backlogs in national parks and provides a mechanism for grant-based funding to Tribal, state, and local governments to expand green space. The Great American Outdoors Act can be used as a legal and funding tool to assist with initiatives to provide more green space for residents in rural and urban communities and advance public health.
Congress has the potential to build upon the progress of the Great American Outdoors Act by expanding upon its focus on increasing access to parks and green spaces in low-income communities and communities of color through the Outdoors for All Act, a bill within the Expanding Public Lands Outdoor Recreation Experiences (EXPLORE) Act. The Outdoors for All Act passed in the House of Representatives in April of 2024. Now the Senate has the opportunity to do the same.
Public lands improve public health
Public lands improve air and water pollution levels, provide opportunities for outdoor recreation, and assist climate change mitigation efforts; all of which directly impact the public’s health. For example, national forests help provide drinking water to over 60 million people living in the U.S., including those in large cities like Atlanta, Denver, and Los Angeles. We rely on the conservation of these lands for continued access to safe drinking water. It’s crucial for public health officials and advocates to pay attention to conservation efforts and use their knowledge and expertise to advance these efforts in the U.S.
Research demonstrates associations between time spent in nature and improved cognitive function, mental health, blood pressure, sleep, and physical activity. Parks and green spaces can also encourage community cohesion and decrease loneliness by providing a place for connection. A 2023 Trust for Public Land report points to an analysis of the organization’s annual ParkScore Index that shows that residents in the top 25 ParkScore cities are, on average, nine percent less likely to have poor mental health than residents of cities that are ranked lower for park access.
Additionally, public lands provide economic benefits. The USDA’s Economic Research Service found that recreation and tourism, both natural results of national parks, contribute to better health outcomes. The U.S. outdoor recreation economy’s real gross output totaled $862 billion in 2021, providing over 4.5 million jobs. In the case of small towns near national parks, tourism contributes to the economic success of communities.
What the Great American Outdoors Act does
When the Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA) was signed into law on August 4th, 2020, it included the National Parks and Public Land Legacy Restoration Fund (LRF) to address the maintenance backlogs many national parks were experiencing. The signing of the GAOA provided funding of the LRF for five years at $1.9 billion annually to build and maintain park infrastructure, though the project backlogs were estimated at over $22 billion in total. Bureau of Indian Education (BIE)-funded schools have also received funds for renovations under the program.
The GAOA also secured full funding of the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF). The LWCF will receive up to $900 million annually and be funded by revenue from offshore oil and gas leases. The funds are allocated among the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service (NPS), the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the U.S. Forest Service, and state and local governments.
The LWCF has existed since 1965 but relied on annual congressional appropriations for funding until the passage of the GAOA. The program provides matching grants to state governments to support the creation and renovation of green spaces and recreation sites from Harpers Ferry in West Virginia to local playgrounds and sports fields. The fund has supported projects in every county in the country. Tribes can work with states to receive funding for recreation and conservation projects through the LWCF as well. A federal portion of the LWCF is used to fund the acquisition of lands and waters, and fulfill the goals of the NPS.
The Outdoor Recreation Legacy Partnership (ORLP) is a matching grant program established by Congress in 2014. It is funded through LWCF and delivers grants to urban areas to create new and revitalize existing parks, with priority given to low-income areas. Despite its financial limitations as a matching grant program, over $118 million has been awarded in ORLP grants thus far.
Inequities in the outdoors
Making the outdoors more accessible increases health across communities, yet there are many inequities in access to green spaces and natural areas. Studies show that historically redlined neighborhoods have less green space and higher rates of noise, light, and air pollution. Low-income neighborhoods are also more vulnerable to high temperatures. The South Bronx in New York City, where 90 percent of the residents are Black or Latino/a, can reach temperatures up to eight degrees higher than predominately White neighborhoods less than one mile away. Deaths from heat stress in New York City are twice as high among Black residents as among White residents.
This is just one example of how environmental racism is embedded into the deliberate zoning practices and housing policies that U.S. cities are built upon. Sociologist Robert Bullard defined environmental racism as “any policy, practice, or directive that differentially affects or disadvantages (where intended or unintended) individuals, groups, or communities based on race.” Despite having been illegal since 1968, the enduring effects of redlining continue to contribute to large disparities in health outcomes. Green spaces help keep neighborhoods cool, but communities of color are less likely to have sufficient access to parks.
Disparities persist in outdoor recreation. NPS survey data found that only 23 percent of national park visitors are people of color, despite people of color accounting for 42 percent of the U.S. population. This gap is, in part, a result of the history of discrimination in U.S. public parks. Key leaders in the creation of national parks, such as John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt, held racist views and saw the expansion of public lands as a way to bar communities of color from accessing outdoor spaces. National parks were not fully desegregated until the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The effects of exclusionary policies linger, as demonstrated by continued diversity gaps in visitor demographics. If national parks are to continue to thrive, they must become more inclusive.
Looking ahead
The GAOA is an historic, bipartisan investment in the conservation of U.S. national parks and public lands. National parks have seen drastic improvements in infrastructure, with maintenance projects such as the Tuolumne Meadows Campground modernization in Yosemite National Park, and Mammoth Cave National Park’s underground trail renovations already serving as examples of LRF success stories.
National parks are a key aspect of the GAOA, but there are benefits to green space no matter the size. State governments have had success in leveraging programs like ORLP to address the divides in access to outdoor recreation. This has led to projects like the Three Mile Creek Greenway Project in Mobile, Alabama, where a fitness circuit, lighting, and benches changed Three Mile Creek from a stormwater conveyance into a greenway system for recreation. Manhattan Marsh Park in Toledo, Ohio, is another example. ORLP helped provide boardwalks, paths, and canoe and kayak launches to a 73-acre outdoor space where access was previously limited. Congress has the opportunity to expand and improve this program by enacting the Outdoors for All Act.
Public health authorities, advocates, and professionals can continue this progress by working with communities, along with Tribal, state, and local governments to apply for GAOA funds to build necessary infrastructure in neighborhoods where green space needs are not met. As climate change worsens extreme weather conditions in urban areas, green spaces will become more critical to mitigate the impacts of extreme heat, worsening air quality, and flash floods. Everyone deserves to enjoy our national parks and urban green spaces, and public health professionals are in a unique position to use the GAOA as a legal tool to work towards that vision.
This post was written by Leah Terry, Program Coordinator, Network for Public Health Law — National Office and reviewed by Jill Krueger, J.D., Director of Climate and Health.
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