Law Enforcement Officer and Firefighter Recreation Pass Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. HOYLE of Oregon. Madam Speaker, H.R. 183 would amend the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act to provide free America the Beautiful passes to law enforcement officers and firefighters.

Expanding outdoor recreation and ensuring Americans can access and enjoy our public lands is a shared bipartisan priority on the Natural Resources Committee. Currently, the National Park Service offers free national park and Federal recreation land passes to certain groups, including U.S. military members and veterans. This legislation builds on this framework by waiving entrance, standard amenity, and day-use fees at over 2,000 Federal recreation sites for law enforcement officers and firefighters.

These hardworking Americans put their lives on the line to protect and serve our communities every day. An America the Beautiful pass is a small but hopefully meaningful token of appreciation for their public service.

Furthermore, let me say that I am glad to see my Republican colleagues acknowledging the importance of our public servants, and I hope they will join us, in the spirit of this legislation, to do more to support and protect all of our Federal first responders.

These public servants dedicate their lives to serving the American people. The administration has created chaos and confusion that adds to the difficulty of their jobs through Federal hiring freezes, which have left them short-staffed.

In addition to showing our appreciation for these critical public servants and first responders, I hope my colleagues will work with us to make sure that our Federal workers have the tools that they need to do their jobs, to keep us safe, and to also keep our public lands open and operating and in the hands of we the people.

For too many of our public lands and parks, after Federal employees have been fired, let go, or pushed toward retirement, private entities are managing these parks, so the America the Beautiful pass is not able to allow free access to these public servants and people who have put their lives on the line to protect and serve our country.

Madam Speaker, I would love to work with everyone on that, as well. I urge my colleagues to support this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I agree with my colleagues that we should defend the police and firefighters. I come from a family of police and firefighters who put their lives on the line every day when they went to work. I will happily work with my Republican colleagues to defend police and firefighters and make sure not to defund them by protecting their public pensions, collective bargaining rights, cancer prevention, training grants, and grants to our local police departments that are now being frozen, putting us in limbo.

This is a very real issue that I know I can work with my Republican colleagues on to make sure that our public lands are not being operated by private entities that refuse to recognize the benefits provided for in this law. This is happening across the country, and in my district, I know specifically, where they refuse to grant free entry for veterans and military personnel. They say that they don't have to because they are a private entity.

I would love to make sure that whoever is operating our public parks is keeping them public and that these people who earned our trust and earned this benefit and every benefit that we can give them are actually able to get that.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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