SOMERSET – Kentucky’s eastern coalfield and the route early explorers took into the state could get a new tourism designation under a bill filed this week.
The measure would require the U.S. Interior Department to study whether 41 counties in Southern and Eastern Kentucky meet the standards to be designated as the Kentucky Wildlands National Heritage Area.
If so, tourism projects in the area would be eligible for federal funding and the National Park Service would provide assistance with projects, according to a news release from U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers.
“Kentucky’s Appalachian region is richly blessed with a thriving wilderness that first captivated one of the nation’s most prominent frontiersmen, Daniel Boone,” said Rogers, a Republican from Somerset who represents the area. “This new designation could open the door for new tourism opportunities and additional funding to help preserve and promote our historic rugged hillsides, lakes and streams.”
Rogers and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell filed companion bills Thursday directing the Interior Department to do the study.
The study could take up to three years if the proposals pass.
The department would report findings and make a recommendation to Congress on whether to approve the designation.
The National Park Service says national heritage areas are places where natural, cultural, and historic resources “combine to form a cohesive, nationally important landscape” and “tell nationally important stories.”
The first one Congress designated was the Illinois & Michigan Canal National Heritage Corridor, based around a canal that opened in 1848.
The canal created a way for travelers to take an all-water route from New York to Chicago and helped boost the rise of Chicago as the crossroads of mid-America, according its site.
Another area helps tell the story of the rise of the auto industry in Michigan and how that helped build the middle class in the U.S., while one in West Virginia is based on the region’s coal heritage.
The study area in Kentucky stretches from the Ashland area across the eastern coalfield and takes in the Cumberland River Valley.
All the counties are defined as being part of Appalachia, but the study doesn’t include all the state’s Appalachian counties.
The area includes historic coal towns such as Benham and Lynch, in Harlan County; the Cumberland Gap area, where explorers and early settlers entered Kentucky; and the old Wilderness Road they used to press westward.
There are a number of standards for designation as a natural heritage area, including whether an area has a collection of natural, historic, and cultural resources that represent “distinctive aspects of the heritage of the United States.”
Congress has designated 55 such areas, but none in Kentucky so far.
The designation wouldn’t take away private property. Unlike national parks, heritage areas are “lived-in landscapes” that use public-private partnerships to support preservation, conservation, recreation, tourism and education, according to the Park Service.
The designation would help promote the area, said Tammy Nazario, head of Eastern Kentucky PRIDE, which Rogers helped found more than 20 years ago to work on cleaning up garbage and improving water quality.
Nazario said the National Coal Heritage Area in West Virginia helped support more than 2,700 jobs in 2016.
“The designation of National Heritage Areas has proven to have an incredible economic impact directly related to tourism,” Nazario said.
By Bill Estep
Lexington Herald-Leader
