For Immediate Release
Office of the Press Secretary
September 28, 2001
President Proclaims National Public Lands Day, 2001
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
The United States has the world's greatest public lands. The National Park System, established in 1916, protects some of America's most beautiful and essential natural resources. Our parks connect Americans with their land, giving us a common landscape and shared national treasures. With more than 80 million acres, these majestic and diverse parks, home to thousands of species of flora and fauna, represent our Nation's most important natural legacy to future generations.
Our national parks provide outstanding
recreational possibilities for Americans, and more than 287 million
visitors each year come to these beautiful places to explore those
possibilities. My Administration recognizes and accepts the
importance of making these great lands more accessible to all our
citizens. Our Government bears a clear and direct
responsibility for the stewardship of our parks. The
Government alone, however, cannot fulfill the promise of preserving
this outdoor legacy -- a legacy first bequeathed to us by President
Theodore Roosevelt and other early visionaries who understood the
importance of these great landscapes, ecosystems, and historic and
cultural settings. Only by developing partnerships among
States, local communities, tribal governments, public agencies, the
nonprofit sector, the private sector, and individual landowners can we
truly maintain and protect our Nation's best places.
National Public Lands Day provides every
American with a unique and valuable opportunity to promote
environmental education and, more importantly, to put their hands to
work on projects directly benefiting public lands. I
encourage Americans to volunteer to build trails, restore habitat,
improve accessibility for visitors with special needs, and repair
weather-related damage. This year, more than 60,000
volunteers are expected to work at approximately 335 sites in all 50
States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. In
cooperation with their community partners, these individuals will
contribute nearly $9 million of needed improvements to America's public
lands.
National Public Lands Day also serves as a
special time for our country to recognize the accomplishments of the
Civilian Conservation Corps, the hard-working men who built more than
800 of America's national and State parks during the 1930s and 1940s.
Ceremonies honoring the Corps will be held at Virginia's Shenandoah
National Park, as well as at 30 other locations throughout the
country.
I encourage Americans to follow the worthy
example set by those CCC members and pitch in by volunteering to
improve our parks. Through these efforts, we can all do our
part to ensure that the Nation's parks, forests, lakes, fields, and
rivers remain vibrant and enduring legacies of America's natural beauty
for ages to come.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH,
President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority
vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do
hereby proclaim September 29, 2001, as National Public Lands
Day. I call upon the people of the United States to observe
this day with appropriate programs and activities to improve the public
lands they use for recreation, education, and enjoyment.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my
hand this twenty-eighth day of September, in the year of our Lord two
thousand one, and of the Independence of the United States of America
the two hundred and twenty-sixth.
GEORGE W. BUSH
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