America’s Historic Places under Existential Threat
Harris Farm barn, Walkersville, Frederick County, Maryland, United States [Acroterion, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons]
Historic places come in all shapes and sizes, dotted across the landscape of the United States of America. They embody the history, culture, stories and shared experience of Americans. The recently released draft federal budget proposal for 2026 threatens the entire heritage conservation system that protects historic places in America through partnerships among governments, civil societies and communities.
The proposed spending cuts could decimate this integrated system that hasbeen so successful in delivering conservation and rehabilitation programs for over 50 years. This system served as a model for a Canadian initiative to sustain its historic places.
The draft funding proposal threatens to dismantle this essential support to America’s historic places. Motivated by a desire to focus on “national treasures”, the 25 percent ($900 million) cut to the operations of the National Park Service proposes the transfer of smaller sites “that receive small numbers of mostly local visitors” to state-level governments. The National Parks Conservation Association estimates that 350 out of 433 national park units could be downloaded to the local level, a situation that the association calls “catastrophic”.
Even more devastating, the budget document proposes a 70 percent ($158 million) cut to the Historic Preservation Fund. This is the fund that enables state and local governments as well as communities to protect, rehabilitate and reuse historic places. This massive funding cut would cripple the State Historic Preservation Offices (SHPOs) and their indigenous equivalent, the Tribal Historic Preservation Offices (THPOs). These offices implement grant programs for historic preservation projects, technical assistance and training. They coordinate nominations to the National Register of Historic Places and certify tax-credit projects for Register properties. They also implement section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act that requires federal agencies to take into account the effects of their projects on cultural resources listed on the Register. The proposed budget would fundamentally reduce or eliminate completely these activities.
The document also states that funding would be “paused” for UNESCO, including resources for the World Heritage Fund. Although the implications are not clear, it puts in doubt future nominations of United States properties to the World Heritage List.
The motivation for the proposed cuts is most clearly expressed in the section on reductions to conservation programs in the Bureau of Land Management. The document states that “excessive designations” of lands and waters have “hamstrung development of valuable energy and mineral resources.” The Wildlife Society reports a similar pattern for federally-owned natural resource management: the transfer to state and local authorities of natural properties to give priority to mineral extraction and energy production.
At this stage, this is only a proposal that requires approval in the United States Congress. If Congress eventually accepts the White House draft budget for 2026 expenditures, the impact would be devastating. Research and administration in the historic conservation field would be gutted and a successful system would be dismantled. Protection and conservation of America’s historic places would be weakened. Such spending cuts present an existential threat to the identification, conservation and interpretation of America’s historic places and a loss to communities across the land.
See also:
ICOMOS-USA cancels the 2025 Symposium: https://worldheritageusa.org/symposium/
Oryx, Community Participation - Conservation in troubled times (Readers’ tip)
Links in text:
federal budget proposal for 2026: https://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/information-resources/budget/the-presidents-fy-2026-discretionary-budget-request/ (landing page) or https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Fiscal-Year-2026-Discretionary-Budget-Request.pdf (PFD)
About the Author
Cameron Cameron held the Canada Research Chair in Built Heritage at the University of Montreal from 2005 to 2019 and previously served as a heritage executive with Parks Canada for more than thirty-five years.
