Last week, the House Education and Labor Committee passed HR 3036, The No Child Left Inside Act (NCLI) but OMITTED local and state park and recreation agencies as entities eligible to receive grants for developing environmental education programs.

This bill still needs to be voted on by the full House of Representatives. Here’s what you can to help ensure local park and recreation agencies become eligible for these important funds:

• Contact the Legislative Assistant for Education of your Member of Congress in the House of Representatives. Contact your representative by phone via the capitol switchboard at 202-225-3121 (To find your Representative, go to www.house.gov/ and enter your zip code.)
• Ask your Representative to contact the staff of Chairman George Miller (D-CA),and Ranking Member Rep. Howard McKeon (R-CA),of the House Education and Labor Committee, to request that they include language as a technical correction in the manager’s amendment for NCLI to include local and state park agencies and state natural resource agencies as eligible entities in Section 11, the National Capacity Environmental Education Grant program.

Make these points to your Representative:

• Local, county, regional and state park systems and state natural resource agencies are important partners to schools in providing resources and connections to nature that can help in developing environmental education programs and enhancing curriculum content.
• Without the resources provided in the competitive grant program, local and state park and natural resource agencies will not be able to serve the many schools and teachers who will be seeking to develop long-term partnerships and environmental education opportunities in local and regional settings. They simply won’t have the resources to meet this demand, thus drastically limiting the potential of the Act to increase environmental education opportunities for students, and limiting the opportunities for professional development by teachers.
• Please let NRPA know if you contact your Member of Congress, and what their response was, so we can continue our advocacy efforts. For questions or updates on the No Child Left Inside Act, please contact Stacey Pine at spine@nrpa.org or (202)887-0290.

For more information about the No Child Left Inside Act and to watch a video produced by the No Child Left Inside Coalition, go to the Citizen Branch homepage.

“Please call or write your representative and ask that local and state P&R agencies be included in the bill. Considering the vast majority of individuals utilize local P&R facilities (nature preserves, nature centers, local/nearby parks, state parks, etc.) for programming and exploring nature with children, as opposed to just federal lands, it is surprising that local agencies were not included.

Your local P&R department (as well as others across the country) need access to this funding source, if we’re to be expected to play our part - and increase our services - in regards to getting children outdoors and providing/increasing these services. Local P&R facilities are typically the nearest facilities “close to home” for most families (meaning they are most accessible and convenient to visit, and typically get much more “repeat/return visitation” due to their proximity to suburban/urban areas), hence they need to be included in the entire No Child Left Inside initiative, including potential funding sources.

Please take the time to call or write at your earliest convenience. Thank you for your support.”

- courtesy of Mike Kirschman of the Mecklenburg County Park and Recreation Dept., NC

Please forward to anyone else interested.