Sponsors (2)
Official title: Enhance the preservation, maintenance, and management of national historic trails and national scenic trails, and for other purposes.
Introduced September 4, 2025 by Timothy Michael Kaine · Last progress September 4, 2025
The bill strengthens federal support, funding eligibility, and formal roles for trail stewardship—boosting conservation, maintenance, volunteer engagement, and local tourism planning—while concentrating funds and responsibilities in selected partners, raising taxpayer costs, creating potential liability and access conflicts for local groups and private landowners, and adding administrative complexity.
Nonprofits, local governments, tribes, and volunteers gain clear, federally recognized roles and authorities to operate and manage designated trails, including eligibility for direct appropriations to support stewardship.
Trails (including the Appalachian Trail) receive stronger federal backing and eligibility for federal conservation programs (e.g., LWCF), increasing resources for land protection, planning, and long-term preservation.
Managers can set and use defined visitor capacity and segment-level rules to reduce overcrowding and resource damage, protecting sensitive trail segments and visitor experiences.
Taxpayers could face increased federal spending because the bill authorizes open-ended 'such sums as necessary' through FY2026–FY2031 to support designated partners and programs.
Delegating expanded operational roles to nonprofits and local partners may shift costs, liability, and insurance burdens onto organizations that lack sufficient funding or capacity.
Allowing direct, non‑competitive appropriations and requiring agencies to prioritize partner-proposed priority lists could concentrate federal funds in selected nonprofits, reduce competitive transparency, and limit agency discretion.
Based on analysis of 5 sections of legislative text.
Requires partnership-based management for covered trails, designates the Appalachian Trail Conservancy within one year, mandates segment-level visitor-capacity planning and economic impact assessments, and authorizes funding for FY2026–FY2031.
Creates policies and requirements to strengthen cooperative management of federally designated national scenic and historic trails, using the Appalachian National Scenic Trail as the model. Directs the Interior and Agriculture Secretaries to officially recognize the Appalachian Trail Conservancy as the Designated Operational Partner within one year, requires segment-level visitor-capacity planning and periodic economic assessments of gateway communities, mandates joint reports to congressional committees, and authorizes funding for program implementation for FY2026–FY2031.