The Outdoor Policy Forecast for 2024
Photo credit: William Woodward
Every year, Outdoor Alliance’s policy team shares its predictions for what will happen in the world of outdoor advocacy in the year ahead.
While predicting what will happen in Congress is difficult at best, our team has had a canny ability to forecast, which has enabled us to prioritize and win on key outdoor policy issues over the last ten years. Here are the five big things we think will be the biggest focus for recreation, conservation, and climate advocacy this year:
Government shutdown is back on the table, and another round of spending cuts is likely. Back in November, with a government shutdown looming, legislators kicked the can down the road by passing a short-term CR (continuing resolution) to keep the government funding. Now, Congress has to pass half of the funding bills by mid-January and the second half in February. Either of these could precipitate a partial government shutdown, and public lands would be most affected by the February bills, which would fund government agencies like the Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, and Forest Service.
A recreation policy package still has a solid chance of passing. Despite the difficulty of moving most legislation through a divided Congress, a recreation package—called America’s Outdoor Recreation Act in the Senate and the EXPLORE Act in the House—has continued to have momentum, with bipartisan champions in both chambers. We are expecting the House to vote its package out of committee pretty briskly in the new year, and then work with the Senate to reconcile it with their package. This recreation package would be a marquee success for the outdoor community, but it won’t move by itself and our voices will be increasingly important to rallying support from lawmakers to pass it.
A modest lands package at the end of 2024. In December, the Senate marked up a package of public lands protections and a few big landscape protections got voted out of committee, which was a big step. While the House has made significantly less progress on protective designations, there is still strong interest in passing a small collection of public lands protections. Our prediction is that this would likely happen at the end of 2024, and while it could be more of a long shot, stranger things have happened in D.C.
Expect a lot of administrative activity on public lands and climate. With Biden’s first term coming to a close and Congress shifting its attention to the election around midyear, the administration is likely to move aggressively on many of its conservation and climate priorities. We are expecting a final BLM Public Lands Rule imminently, as well as more work on the Forest Service climate and old growth rule, new oil and gas leasing regulations, the Northwest Forest Plan kicking off, and a flurry of National Monument activity. The administration will want to finalize a lot of this work before May (the deadline after which a new Congress can unroll a prior administration’s rules, if it chooses), but there will likely be issues they continue to work on and close out before the end of the year.
Farm bill in late summer. Congress passed a one-year extension for the Farm Bill, which needed to be renewed last September. The Farm Bill has a number of big issues that are important for outdoor recreationists, including wildfire management, recreation funding, and clarity on closing National Forests.
Election years tend to be frenetic in their first half before everyone’s attention is swallowed by the election. The lame duck (the period after the election and before the next Congress begins) can be a window of opportunity, but a lot will depend on the outcome of the election. If Republicans have a strong showing, they will be unlikely to make a lot of deals with Democrats, but if Democrats stay in power, they will likely be motivated to do a lot at the end of the year.
As always, the voices of people who care about conservation and the outdoors continue to be very influential to lawmakers. You can be a part of creating more wins for conservation, climate, and outdoor recreation this year by signing up to get action alerts where we give you relevant and actionable opportunities to protect the places you love and conserve the outdoors.