New Mexico Economic Development Department

4 5 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 3, ISSUE 7 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 3, ISSUE 7 NEW MEX I CO ECONOMI C DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT expand. One clear success story is the ORD’s $100,000 Local Economic Development Act (LEDA) investment in Earth Traveler teardrop trailers. The LEDA funds will help the company hire 23 people to build high-end, lightweight travel campers in Santa Fe. Fundamentally, businesses like Earth Traveler rely on access to healthy public lands and waters in the state. To that end, ORD runs a grant program to sustainably develop and maintain outdoor access in communities. The Outdoor Recreation Trails+ grant launched in 2020 with just over $75,000 in funding to invest in six outdoor access projects, including trailheads, signage, and picnic tables. The grant amount grew to $500,000 in 2021 to support 25 projects. In 2022, Trails+ is investing $7 million to increase outdoor access. This money will go to communities from Farmington to Silver City, Carlsbad to Taos, to build trails, river access, city open space and much more. The first round of 2022 Trails+ awardees will be announced in June, with the second announced in the fall. Conservation is at the heart of this outdoor access. After all, we need to protect these places in order to benefit from them recreationally. To that end, ORD is leading a petition to designate 125 miles of river in New Mexico as Outstanding National Resource Waters b ased on their “outstanding” recreational significance to