ORR, Confluence of States Urge More State Rec. Offices – RVBusiness – Breaking RV Industry News
The Outdoor Recreation Roundtable and Confluence of States hosted a webinar Wednesday afternoon to encourage industries and supporters of outdoor recreation to create more state offices dedicated to backing outdoor recreation.
Currently, there are 24 states with such offices. Those offices tackle such duties as marketing the states’ outdoor opportunities, securing funding to improve access to outdoor recreation spots and even supporting industries such as the RV industry, marine industry and other businesses that make enjoying the outdoors possible.
The two national groups recently launched a program called 25 in 2025, an effort to increase the number of states involved in supporting outdoor recreation with offices to at least 25 by the end of the year.
During the webinar, representatives from most of the state offices talked about some of the efforts their states had taken to improve their outdoor recreation economies.
Utah, which established the first state office in 2013, reported that when it first opened its office, the state’s outdoor recreation economy accounted for $4.3 billion.
In 2023, the state reported outdoor recreation brought in $9.5 billion, making for an 8.1% annual growth, ranking it tops in the nation.
Sandi Olek, from Maryland’s office, said the state has created a strategic plan and recently held an outdoor recreation summit.
“Advocates and landscape managers and outfitters and entrepreneurs came together and created the first ever meeting and created a community around outdoor recreation and we’re excited to be entering into our second year.”
Brad Garmon of Michigan’s office talked about getting elementary school students involved in stte parks, but also about creating an outdoor innovation fund to help drive the economic impact of outdoor recreation.
“It’s the first in the country that really drives home the point that Michigan is not just a great place to play, but it’s a great place to produce, create and innovate in manufacturing products and we are excited about that role in the outdoor economy,” he said.
Joe Impecoven from Washington talked about his agency’s efforts to help people reach Olympic National Park after 140 inches of annual rainfall washed out primary access for the main road into the park.
“It didn’t look like we were going to be able to fix the road in time because funding dried up in a tough financial year,” he said. “Fortunately, our office was able to secure $650,000 from an economic development strategic reserve account to restore and reconstruct the road and gain access for this upcoming summer season. So, what am I so excited about in regards to this is it restores access for the 460,000 annual visitors that come to this area who contribute $444 million just in Jefferson County alone, and $39 million of state and tax revenue.”
In support of the 25 in 2025 effort, the Confluence of States has created a brochure to help those interested in creating state offices.
There are a number of helpful documents available at https://www.confluenceofstates.com/state-resources, but top of the list is How to Create and Office of Outdoor Recreation, a 15-page PDF with tips and resources from those who have successfully established offices.
“The guide goes through the five key steps we’ve identified to support state efforts,” said Maribel Casteñada, manager of the Confluence of States.
Those steps are building a bipartisan coalition, creating a mission, finding allies in government, choosing an agency to establish the office in and then asking the experts for help.
How to Create and Office of Outdoor Recreation can be found online as can information from both ORR and Confluence of States.
More information on 25 in 2025 can be found on the ORR website.
