Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell and U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman addressed more than 50 outdoor industry leaders at the 2015 OIA Capitol Summit, which kicked off Tuesday evening and concludes Thursday at noon.
Jewell spoke at the event’s opening reception Tuesday evening about the investment made in outdoor recreation by Interior’s 2016 proposed budget and the importance of ending the Congressional policy of budget sequestration that prompted the closure of National Parks in 2013.
Jewell also stressed the importance of President Obama’s trade agenda to the industry and the outdoor recreation economy, including the proposed Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP).
Ambassador Froman, the top trade advisor to President Obama, stressed the benefits of the TPP, a trade agreement currently being negotiated by the United States and 11 other countries in the Asia-Pacific region, including Mexico, Canada, Vietnam, Australia and Japan. Froman said the agreement would reflect the industry’s values of social and environmental responsibility and would have the strongest enforcement mechanisms in these areas of any trade agreement in American history.
Speakers at the annual lobbying event also included Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, who stressed the importance of the outdoor industry's engagement in climate change policy, and Representative Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, who pledged to make sure the administration heard from him about the outdoor industry's values of social and environmental responsibility in the TPP.
Jewell, Froman and the Congressional leaders kicked off the largest OIA Capitol Summit ever held and an event that saw the most ever “member meetings” booked, meaning meetings that are attended by the Senator or Representative versus only staff.
“The outdoor industry is coming to Washington at one of the most opportune times in our history,” said Steve Barker, OIA’s Interim Executive Director. “We have a seat at the table and are clearly being listened to at the highest levels of government as well as policymakers back home in communities across the United States. Now is the time to convert this attention into real wins for our industry.”
Capitol Summit attendees also awarded the 2015 Friend of the Outdoor Industry Award to Senator Kelly Ayotte, Republican of New Hampshire, and Representative Jared Polis, a Democrat representing OIA’s Boulder headquarters in Colorado’s second district.
The Friend Award is given to members of Congress or administration officials who promote the outdoor industry’s interests through policy and regular support.
Both Ayotte and Polis are among the strongest champions in Congress of the outdoor industry’s recreation and trade policy agendas.
The outdoor industry is uniquely positioned at the convergence of business and international trade issues that are rooted in the industry values of stewardship, conservation and responsible recreation, allowing industry leaders to speak with particular credibility on recreation and trade issues.
The record number of Capitol Summit attendees asked Congress to invest in the outdoor recreation through full funding of the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) and pass the Wildfire Disaster Funding Act (WDFA) to provide the badly needed resources to fight the increasingly devastating wildfires that spread across the Western states.
On the industry’s international trade agenda, executives lined up cosponsors for the U.S. OUTDOOR Act, OIA’s signature trade legislation to eliminate import taxes on recreational performance outerwear that has no domestically produced counterpart. The lobby teams also asked members of Congress to support the TPP and legislation to grant the president trade promotion authority (TPA), legislation granting the president the authoiry needed to conclude negotiations on the trade deal.
The executive teams also asked Congress to support the RAMPARTS bill, legislation that would clarify the Federal Trade Commission's role in Made in the USA product labeling.
