FYI

RE: New Executive Order whereby all federal agencies must have inventoried
their historic properties and evaluated their potential for "community
economic development," including such uses as heritage tourism and
public-private partnerships.

NCH WASHINGTON UPDATE (Vol. 9, #10; 7 March 2003)
by Bruce Craig <[log in to unmask]>
National Coalition for History (NCH)
Website: http:www2.h-net.msu.edu/~nch
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1. PRESIDENT ISSUES EXECUTIVE ORDER LAUNCHING "PRESERVE AMERICA" INITIATIVE
On 3 March 2003, President Bush signed an Executive Order (EO) entitled
"Preserve America" stating that, "It is the policy of the federal
government to provide leadership in preserving America's heritage by
actively advancing the protection, enhancement, and contemporary use of the
historic properties owned by the federal government, and by promoting
intergovernmental cooperation and partnerships for the preservation and use
of historic properties"
(http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030304-9.html). That
same day the President's wife, Laura Bush, formally announced the new
"Preserve America" program in a speech before some 1,700 representatives of
the National Association of Counties during their annual legislative
conference in Washington D.C.
(http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03).

Executive Order 13287 was crafted with a number of objectives in
mind. First, it provides a philosophical umbrella for federal agency
historic preservation efforts. It sends a clear statement from the White
House to all agency heads of their ongoing historic preservation
responsibilities under Sections 110 and 111 of the National Historic
Preservation Act (NHPA) and other federal preservation laws. To that end,
the EO requires all federal agencies to examine their policies and
procedures and to ensure that their actions "encourage, support, and foster
public-private initiatives and investment in the use, reuse, and
rehabilitation of historic properties to the extent that such support is
not inconsistent with other provisions of law."

Rather than delegate historic preservation responsibilities to lower
ranking officials in the federal bureaucracy, agency heads are directed to
"designate a senior policy level official" who will have oversight
responsibility for agency historic preservation programs. According to the
EO, "This senior official shall be an assistant, deputy assistant
secretary, or the equivalent. " To assist agencies in meeting the other
requirements of the EO, the National Park Service, working in consultation
with the Advisory Council for Historic Preservation (ACHP), is to develop
and to make available to agency heads education, training, and historic
property awareness materials.

Second, the EO lays out the Bush administration's framework for improving
stewardship, planning, and accountability in federal agency historic
preservation programs. A central thrust of the EO mandates an assessment
of the current use of all federal historic properties. When appropriate,
the EO directs agencies to consider making such properties available to
non-federal entities to advance local community and economic objectives,
provided they are "consistent with agency missions." To this end, by
September 2004, all federal agencies must have inventoried their historic
properties and evaluated their potential for "community economic
development," including such uses as heritage tourism and public-private
partnerships. Agency findings are to be made to the Secretary of the
Interior and to the Advisory Council. In these assessments, agencies must
examine opportunities for enhanced "public benefit from, and access to
Federally owned historic properties."

Third, the EO also seeks to promote historic preservation through heritage
tourism. ACHP observers report that the current chair of the Advisory
Council, John Nau III, considers heritage tourism to be a central component
of any successful long-term effort to preserve surplus federal historic
buildings. Thus, the EO directs agencies to work with the Advisory Council,
state governments, Indian tribes, and local communities to promote the use
of historic properties for heritage tourism purposes, thus insuring
long-term "productive use" of such properties.

Historic preservationists have been expecting this EO for some time. An
initial draft of the EO was developed late in the Clinton administration as
part of the Democratic president's "stewardship" initiative. With the
election of President Bush, however, the EO was reevaluated by the ACHP,
modified, and then sent to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for
internal review. Discussions between Advisory Council and OMB officials
extended over a period of months. Insiders report the ACHP draft EO was
crafted in close coordination with the Department of Commerce, the National
Park Service, and other federal agencies. Drafts were submitted to a
broader group of federal agencies twice for review and comment.
Because the EO is so new and its ramifications have not entirely been
fleshed out by preservationists, it has yet to attract much praise or
criticism within the non-federal preservation community. Privately, some
preservationists express the opinion that the EO has "great potential" for
state and local preservation interests, and there is a general recognition
of new "partnership opportunities" in the future. Some express
reservations, fearing that the "devil may be in the details." For example,
given the tremendous controversy generated several decades ago over the
National Park Service's modest and not entirely successful foray into the
historic leasing program, preservationists will be watching with keen eyes
to see whether federal agency missions are impacted by what is expected to
be a broad push toward privatization and more "productive use" of federal
historic properties.

A second concern is funding and administrative infrastructure. While the
Veterans Administration (VA), for example, may be able to compile a huge
catalog of historic properties under its jurisdiction with relative ease
thus meeting the technical requirements of the EO's inventory mandate,
whether the VA will have sufficient staff and funding to manage other new
responsibilities required by the EO is questionable. Most federal agencies
are strapped for funds now, and this EO is perceived by some agency
insiders as yet another "unfunded federal mandate." In this vein, some
preservationists view the EO as a useful philosophical framework but see
little infrastructure for carrying out the program. Some also fear that
after seeing last year's dramatic cuts to the National Park Service's
National Register Programs ($765,000) and cuts to the state historic
preservation programs ($6 million), the administration may attempt to "raid
the Historic Preservation Fund to help pay for the program."

In her comments to the National Association of Counties, Laura Bush spoke
of her pride in serving as honorary chair of the "Save America's Treasures"
initiative which, along with several natural resource initiatives,
ultimately may be repackaged as part of the "new" initiative. Though
details are sketchy as to what exactly is to be part of the broader
"Preserve America" Initiative above and beyond the issuance of the EO
(preservation insiders expect an awards program and possibly some small
amounts of grant money to assist in implementing the initiative), according
to Mrs. Bush, in its broadest sense, "Preserve America will promote
historic and cultural preservation and encourage greater public
appreciation of our national treasures."