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June/July 2024 | maconmagazine.com 95 In November 2023, the National Park Service released a special resource study stating that the Ocmulgee River Corridor was suitable for federal protection due to its unique cultural and environmental significance, marking a key step forward in the long-fought campaign. The scope of the 2019 park proposal that the 2023 study had evaluated, however, led NPS to determine that the area did not meet economic feasibility criteria for National Park status, primarily due to land acquisition and management costs. In response, the Ocmulgee Mounds Park and Preserve Establishment Act proposed to Congress this May includes strategies to mitigate this concern, including expansion stages. The new boundaries were proposed with feedback collected from the Muscogee (Creek) Nation; local elected officials; business, faith, agricultural, environmental, and community leaders; Robins Air Force Base; and more. Proponents of the bill are optimistic that now, a er monumental efforts over several decades, the National Park and Preserve will come to pass in the 118th Congress. The national park's economic impact could be massive. An independent study conducted by the National Parks Conservation Association estimates that over the course of 15 years a er being re-designated a National Park and Preserve, the region's municipalities can expect a collective increase in tax revenue annually of $29.8 million because of the projected $206.7 million of total economic activity generated from the Park and Preserve. The study estimates that the region should prepare for an increase of 1.16 million visitors annually and for the roughly $76.5 million increase in annual labor income that could be generated by an influx of almost 3,000 jobs, explained Macon-Bibb Mayor Pro Tem and Ocmulgee National Park and Preserve Initiative Executive Director Seth Clark in a news release. "The impact and resulting expenditures will spur entrepreneurship, create jobs, and transform underserved areas of rural economies," expressed Jessica Walden, President and CEO of the Greater Macon Chamber of Commerce. "Congress only acts in a bipartisan manner when an ideologically diverse constituency demands it. Middle Georgia is doing that, and we're doing it together, despite the national trend of dri ing apart. Working together in good faith despite disagreement is what will save America, and that's what this legislation represents," Clark told Macon Magazine. "At a moment of such political division and even hatred, this is the tonic that Georgia needs right now." - Sen. Jon Ossoff To learn more about why the Ocmulgee Mounds inspire such unity – from the Central Georgia counties the park spans, to Washington, D.C., to Okmulgee, Oklahoma, and across ideological, racial, and historical divisions – read our ongoing coverage at maconmagazine.com. ABOVE RIGHT Sen. Jon Ossoff visiting the Ocmulgee Mounds. Photo courtesy of the Office of U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff. BELOW RIGHT Sen. Warnock (left) and Muscogee (Creek) citizen and Director of Advocacy for ONPPI Tracie Revis (right) climb the Great Temple Mound in November 2023. Photo by MM Staff.