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Asheville Design Center Helps Businesses Face Pandemic With Design Solutions
As more and more Asheville businesses reopen, the COVID-19 pandemic has required them to need more breathing room – literally. To help businesses adapt to indoor capacity limits and social distancing guidelines, the City of Asheville has contracted with MountainTrue’s Asheville Design Center (ADC) to create design solutions that allow businesses to use more public outdoor space.

Support Backcountry Recreation in the Nantahala-Pisgah National Forest Management Plan
Help protect our forests and our backcountry areas by submitting your public comment today. The deadline for public comment is June 29, and this is our last significant opportunity to win better protections and influence how our public lands are managed for the next 15-20 years.

The Great American Outdoors Act Passes The Senate, Reinvests In America’s Public Lands
In a big victory for our public lands, The Great American Outdoors Act (SB 3422) was passed by the U.S. Senate on June 17 with bipartisan support and a vote of 73 yeas to 25 nays. The bill will permanently fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) at $900 million per year and allocate $9.5 billion over the next five years to address the maintenance backlogs in America’s National Parks, National Forests, and other public lands.
Introducing Madison County Natural Heritage
Written by Pete Dixon of Madison Natural Heritage Madison Natural Heritage is excited to partner with MountainTrue for the 2020 Madison County BioBlitz aimed at creating a biological inventory of all of Madison County. Madison Natural Heritage is a new educational...

Protect Solar Energy Rights. Oppose The Attempt to End Net Metering By June 15
Solar net metering allows solar energy owners to sell excess solar energy produced by their systems back to the grid, making solar much more affordable and accessible than it would be otherwise. But a shady group called the New England Ratepayers Association (NERA) has filed a petition for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to take over regulation of rooftop solar systems from states – a move that would end net metering as we know it, and cut off an important source of financial savings for solar energy owners in the midst of an economic crisis. Take action to protect solar energy rights by June 15 here.

Protect the Nantahala-Pisgah National Forest — Our Region’s Natural Carbon Sink
The Nantahala and Pisgah National Forests are a tremendous resource in the battle to slow climate change. A 2011 Forest Service assessment estimated that these forests store more than 72 million metric tonnes of carbon, and that number continues to rise as our forests...