Price, UT, June 11, 2024 — The USDA Forest Service Intermountain Region announced its investment in $26,207,000 million in funding from the Great American Outdoors Act (GAOA) to support 21 individual projects across the Intermountain Region in Fiscal Year 2024. These investments are made possible by the National Parks and Public Land Legacy Restoration Fund (LRF) established by the Great American Outdoors Act.
These projects support the recent announcement by both the Departments of Agriculture and Interior proposing a combined $2.8 billion in funding for Fiscal Year 2025 to improve infrastructure, recreation facilities, public lands access, and land and water conservation as the legislation enters its fourth out of fifth year.
Including the authorized and funded deferred maintenance projects for Fiscal Year 2024, the Intermountain Region currently has 139 LRF projects in various stages of completion, with 50 projects completed. The Manti-La Sal Forest currently has six LRF Projects in various stages of development, with two projects completed; the $115,000 investment for Fiscal Year 2024 on the Manti-La Sal Forest has been awarded for projects that improve road and trail signage, including inventory, planning, purchasing, and installation of new road and trail signs across USDA Forest Service lands within Utah’s Carbon, Emery, San Juan, and Sanpete Counties.
Since 2021, the Forest Service has completed more than 267 deferred maintenance projects across 41 states and Puerto Rico with more than 880 additional projects currently funded and in various stages of completion. For additional information about the Forest Service implementation of the Great American Outdoors Act, visit: https://www.fs.usda.gov/
The Great American Outdoors Act addresses the growing $8.6 billion backlog of deferred maintenance on national forest and grasslands. The Forest Service currently administers more than 370,000 miles of roads, 13,900 trail and road bridges, 160,000 miles of trails, 1,500 dams and reservoirs, 1,500 communications sites, and 30,000 recreation sites across the United States and Puerto Rico.