National Defense Authorization Act Passes Without Land Protections

Sitkum River on the Olympic Peninsula. Photo by Thomas O'Keefe.

On Friday, the defense spending bill – the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) – became law, but it unfortunately did not include 4 million acres of land protections that the outdoor community has been advocating for since the spring.

While it’s disappointing not to see the land protections pass, our efforts still make a difference. In the past few months, the outdoor community has sent more than 13,000 letters to legislators about these protective bills. Even though they didn’t pass this time, our efforts to make land protections a priority help these bills become top-of-mind unfinished business for the next Congress.

The land protections we have been working  include a package called the Protecting America’s Wilderness Act, comprising the Wild Olympics Wilderness and Wild and Scenic Rivers Act (originally H.R. 2642/S. 1382), the Colorado Wilderness Act of 2020 (originally H.R. 2546, see map), the Northwest California Wilderness, Recreation, and Working Forests Act (originally H.R. 2250/S.1100, see map), the Central Coast Heritage Protection Act (originally H.R. 2199/S. 1111, see map), the San Gabriel Mountains Foothills and Rivers Protection Act (originally H.R. 2215/S. 1109, see map), and Rim of the Valley Corridor Preservation Act (originally H.R. 1708), as well as the CORE Act (in Colorado) and the Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act (in Arizona). The outdoor community has helped design and advocate for most of these bills at every stage, and they include protections for valued landscapes for outdoor recreation, including climbing, mountain biking, hiking, paddling, and more. You can read more about these bills here. The House passed the Protecting America’s Wilderness Act back in February and had included the full suite of protections in its version of the NDAA it passed in September.

We were hopeful that when House and Senate leadership came together to determine the final version of the NDAA, they would include land protection. In 2014, the NDAA included significant land protections that had been vetted and had strong support from the outdoor community. While we were not successful this time, we are optimistic that our continued efforts are getting these bills closer to being passed.

You can make a difference by writing your member of Congress now and asking them to keep these bills on the front burner for immediate action in the new Congress.