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What Will New Federal Conservation Fund Rules Mean for Nevada?

Lexington Arch at Great Basin National Park east of Ely.
Courtesy National Park Service

Lexington Arch at Great Basin National Park east of Ely.

When President Donald Trump signed  the Great American Outdoors Act in August, he said “ there hasn’t been anything like this since Teddy Roosevelt.” 

 

It was debatable whether the Act equaled Roosevelt’s creation of the National Park system. But the bipartisan legislation did set aside $2 billion per year for park maintenance, and it fully funded the Land and Water Conservation Fund, a longtime goal of the conservation community. 

 

Then, last month,  Interior Secretary David Bernhardt released rules about how the funds can be spent. And those rules have some conservationists crying foul. 

 

Russell Kuhlman, Executive Director, Nevada Wildlife Federation;  Bob Mergell, Administrator, Nevada Division of State Parks

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Desert Companion welcomed Heidi Kyser as staff writer in January 2014. In 2018, she was promoted to senior writer and producer, working for both DC and KNPR's State of Nevada. She produced KNPR’s first podcast, the Edward R. Murrow Regional Award-winning Native Nevada, in 2020. The following year, she returned her focus full-time to Desert Companion, becoming Deputy Editor, which meant she was next in line to take over when longtime editor Andrew Kiraly left in July 2022. In 2024, Interim CEO Favian Perez promoted Heidi to managing editor, charged with integrating the Desert Companion and State of Nevada newsroom operations.