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 AT MEMPHIS HERITAGE

Important Preservation Law Needs Your Help!

Section 4f" doesn't sound important -- but it is the strongest federal preservation law on the books, and its loss would be a devastating blow to efforts to protect America's heritage.  -- National Trust for Historic Preservation website
 
Our partners at the National Trust of Historic Preservation, Preservation Action, and the Tennessee Preservation Trust are currently involved in the crucial national effort to save Section 4 (f) of the Department of Transportation Act. Since 1966, this provision has saved many of our nation's historic and scenic areas from being carelessly destroyed or adversely impacted by road construction. But now it is threatened-- all in the name of "streamlining" environmental review processes.  We need you to help too!

Please contact the offices of Senators Alexander and Frist and let them know this is one of the most stringent ways we can balance road construction with the needs of our special historic places.  It is also especially critical for those of you in Representative Duncan and Rep. Lincoln Davis' districts to contact them, as they serve on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.  You can find addresses of your legislators, as well as more information on 4(f) by visiting www.preservationaction.org. Below is some quick summary information drawn from the National Trust's website.  Click here for a pdf  file prepared by the National Trust and Preservation Action with some talking points.   Finally, a form letter is available by clicking  Form Letter.

Summary Information

The Bush Administration's transportation reauthorization bill, known as SAFETEA, would eviscerate the protections provided by Section 4(f). While SAFETEA would retain the existing "no feasible and prudent alternative" language, it also contains so many exemptions and redefinitions that road-builders could easily plow straight through 4(f). For example, SAFETEA would give transportation planners the power to decide whether a historic place is important enough to be avoided -- even if that site was already in the National Register of Historic Places, America's official list of places worthy of preservation.

Part of the Department of Transportation Act adopted by Congress in 1966, Section 4(f) states that transportation projects must avoid historic sites unless there is "no feasible and prudent alternative" and requires "all possible planning to minimize harm" to historic places. This unequivocal "hands-off" directive has been invoked hundreds of times over the past 35 years to keep the nation's heritage from being bulldozed and blacktopped, as examples from around the country show.

The revision effort is largely fueled by the perception in some quarters that measures intended to protect natural and cultural treasures cause major delays in road projects. In reality, recent reports by the General Accounting Office and the Federal Highway Administration show that lack of money and local disagreements, not preservation and environmental reviews, that slow down construction.

Please read more at www.nationaltrust.org/issues/transportation/4(f)_overview.html