The outdoor recreation community sent one of its biggest living heroes to Congress Friday to advocate higher federal spending on the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) in the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1.
Conrad Anker, a world-renowned alpine climber best known for his 1999 discovery of lost explorer George Mallory’s body on Mt. Everest, testified Friday before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Interior, the Environment and Related Agencies in support of the LWCF, which has provided billions of dollars over the last 40 years for federal, state and local parks and recreation projects. But Anker, who is now in his 27th year of working for The North Face, spoke as much about jobs and sales as crags and vistas.
“It is instructive to note that in the last 11 years The North Face has led sales and growth among its sister companies at VFC, its parent company,” said Anker, who pegged TNF’s annual sales at $1.4 billion. His remarks came a day after Congress cut $149 million, or 33 percent, of LWCF funding from the 2011 federal budget. Anker testified on behalf of a coalition representing conservation, recreation, environmental, business, historic and cultural organizations seeking full funding of LWCF at $900 million per year.
“The outdoor sector is a truly major part of the U.S. economy; one that America still dominates globally; and one that represents opportunities for sustained economic growth in communities, rural and urban, across America,” he said
