Posted on 11/25/2007 6:59:57 AM PST by listenhillary
WASHINGTON (AP) — Every region of the country has its own piece of Americana that locals brag about to visitors. Increasingly, they are asking Congress to help spread the word through a little-known federal program that designates National Heritage Areas.
After approving just two dozen such areas since the early 1980s, Congress adopted 10 last year. The House signed off on six more last month, and the wait list is growing.
Illinois wants recognition for Abraham Lincoln's early stomping grounds; New York is bidding for the area around Niagara Falls. Alabama is pushing a region along the Tennessee River where the Tennessee Valley Authority was born and where "Father of the Blues" W.C. Handy first picked a guitar.
Yet for the first time, the program is facing resistance on Capitol Hill from budget hawks and property-rights advocates. The National Park Service has called for a freeze on new designations until lawmakers approve more formal guidelines for the program.
"This is a relatively new model for conservation," said John Cosgrove, executive director of the Alliance of National Heritage Areas. "More and more community leaders want to apply it to their own regional stories."
Modeled after European practices, heritage areas are billed as a cost-effective, locally driven alternative to government-managed historic sites. The government does not buy property, impose land restrictions or provide staff. In fact, the heritage program is expanding in part because little money is available for new publicly owned park facilities.
Instead, grass-roots groups are encouraged to preserve geography and history within livable communities. A heritage designation comes with a federal grant of up to $1 million a year, to be matched with local money.
The local groups have flexibility in managing the areas, and the 37 existing sites have taken various approaches since the first was named in 1984, designating a historic canal linking the Great Lakes and the Illinois River.
While tourism is not necessarily the goal, drawing visitors is a major incentive, and the heritage tag has helped turn around many local economies. A 2004 Michigan State University study found that visitors to a heritage area celebrating southeast Michigan's auto industry spent $123 million and helped create some 2,100 jobs.
"The reason for the increased demand is that they're successful," said Marge Darby, who has helped lead a bid for a "Freedom's Way" heritage area highlighting early American history in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. "They're not just good at helping communities develop their heritage. They also happen to be economically beneficial."
With the popularity of the program growing, critics have emerged.
"This is backdoor federal land-use planning," said Ann Corcoran, who is fighting a "Hallowed Ground" Civil War heritage designation around her western Maryland farm. "Once this is in place, there will be pressure on the local governments to plan their land use around the theme of heritage preservation."
More than 120 lawmakers voted against the recent House bill approving the "Hallowed Ground" and "Freedom's Way" areas, as well as others in Illinois, New York, Alabama and Arizona. The designations, which await Senate approval, drew opposition from groups such as the American Conservative Union and the Property Rights Alliance.
Along with concerns about land restrictions, critics say the federal government has no business funding local conservation.
"I believe in preservation. I just believe in doing it privately," said Corcoran, who once erected plastic pink flamingos on her farm to make the point that landowners are entitled to bad taste. "Why should some poor schmuck who's never going to visit an area pay taxes so that some elitist can go on a historic tour?"
But with a budget of about $13 million, heritage areas cost a fraction of what publicly owned facilities cost. Although many heritage area campaigns have cited threats from development, supporters argue that the program does not lead to land-use restrictions. A 2004 report from independent auditors at what is now the Government Accountability Office backed their claim, saying researchers found no evidence that heritage designations had directly affected private property.
Darby likened the program to drawing an imaginary line around an area and marking it as important.
"The community is the classroom," she said. "You say to children: `Here's where it happened, right here. Here's a bullet hole in this house, and it was a British bullet, and the man who lived in this house was shot right here.'"
The Park Service so far has failed to persuade Congress to establish formal criteria for heritage areas. As a result, the agency has withheld its support for new designations. But officials say the service strongly supports the overall program, particularly with strained budgets for public facilities.
"Getting a park unit is pretty difficult," said Alma Ripps, a legislative affairs specialist for the agency. "Heritage areas are less expensive and are maybe a little easier, although it's still a very high standard. ... There has to be very strong local interest."
On the Net: National Heritage Areas: http://www.nps.gov/history/heritageareas/ GAO 2004 report: http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d04593t.pdf
Yeah, they're trotting this crap out for a reason. Needs to be dealt with.
wonder what tone of voice they would use in speaking these words.
I see they have a link to the heritage website; what, no link to a site that explains the doctrine of property rights and liberty? No link to a website on sound fiscal policy?
I am more comfortable with this trend than I am with seeing endless ranks of townhouses built on the Hallowed Ground trail that runs from north of Gettysburg down to Monticello. How can people understand what we are fighting for if they can’t learn about our past and see America’s glories for themselves?
I saw a quote by some liberal the other day that he expects the Federal Govt. will eventually control all land and be able to direct it’s usage. In effect, private land ownership would come to an end.
I too am very concerned about the Heritage Areas. I do not think government manages land better than private land-owners, and my philosophy on preservation has always been that if enough people want to preserve something, they’ll be able to band together, buy it, and control it. Many of the local ‘preservation’ projects here have been funded by grant money after few people were willing to put in ANY of their own money, which shows that they only want it if it’s free. I want a Rolls Royce if it’s free, but I’ll never put my money toward one - maybe they think government should provide me with one?
They don't believe in property rights OR liberty.
By slowly eroding property rights the Neo-Marxists end the concept of the “ownership” society reducing one and all to flotsam and jetsam rental status dependent upon the Neo-Marxists for their very existence in a rent control environment. As well it strips evil whites of a prime mechanism of wealth building and transmission to their evil white offspring and finally puts the Neo-Marxist government in firm control of designating who the winners and losers in the New World Order will be.
Your view might differ when it is land that you own and you are restricted by government how you can use it.
Voters are embracing socialism it seems every chance they get. Why not have government planning of all land use so the commoners don’t muck it up?
Sad...
The government already does restrict the way I can use my land. I cannot, for instance, open an auto-body shop in my neighborhood.
I simply do not think the government owes it to landowners to ensure that they make a profit on an investment in land, through development or other means.
Ping.
Couldn’t disagree more. The government owes the individual the free use of his property, be it his land, his wealth, or himself so long as that use does not harm another. This is the essence of a free people, a free society.
Would you agree that the government does not owe anybody a guarantee that he will make a profit on an investment?
I agree with this statement. You need to remember that without property rights, the USA would never have been. Those rights are being nibbled away each year.
A National Heritage Area is a place with an imaginary line drawn around it that marks it as "important." More places around the country are asking Congress consider their local towns as "National Heritage Areas," which means an instant back door to federal funding.
http://www.breitbart.com/print.php?id=D8T4MCTG0&show_article=1&catnum=1
Local lawmakers have caught on to this small federally-funded program. Since the 1980s, only two dozen areas are been designated. But just last year, Congress adopted 10 new sites. Last month the House signed off on six more, and the number keeps growing. A heritage designation gets you a federal grant of up to $1 million a year, to be matched with local money.
But now the National Park Service has called for a freeze on all new project designations until Congress can create formal guidelines for the program. In other words, the government has been issuing funds for these "historical areas" without even knowing what a "historical area" actually is.
A word of warning .... If these "National Heritage Areas" are anything like a local historic district, these people are going to regret the day they sought and were granted the designation. With federal money comes regulation. In some of our local historic districts you can't even replace a window or a roof on your home without going through a complicated and sometimes expensive approval process with the local governing agency. Often these local entitles are staffed by bored housewives and retired curmudgeons who are experiencing power for the first time in their lives .. and trust me, it can go to their heads faster than Hillary to a new government spending program.
Now ... don't say I didn't warn you.
Neal Boortz
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