Help us celebrate 50 years of Preservation Action by joining or renewing your membership during our Summer Membership Drive! Annual membership is what powers our efforts to advocate for the critical preservation programs and policies that we depend on. If you rely on the information provided every week in the Legislative Update or our Action Alerts that help you communicate more effectively and easily with your members of Congress, please join or renew your membership TODAY! 

In addition to our weekly Legislative Update, Action Alerts, and Quarterly Newsletters, members receive:



• Invitations to Preservation Action events throughout the year- including member-only tours planned during the PastForward Conference in New Orleans and National Historic Preservation Advocacy Week in Washington, D.C.
• Exclusive this year, new or renewing members who join in July or August will receive a special 50th anniversary enamel pin!

Don't miss out, join or renew your membership TODAY!

Interior Department Prepares Nomination of Civil Rights Sites for World Heritage List

This week the Department of Interior announced that the National Park Service is preparing to potentially nominate 11 sites associated with the U.S Civil Rights Movement for inclusion on the World Heritage List. The sites considered for nomination include sites associated with the Freedom Riders, Brown v. Board of Education, Martin Luther King Jr., sites pivotal to the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham, among others. Nine of the sites are currently operated by the National Park Service.

1. Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, Montgomery, AL

2. Bethel Baptist Church, Birmingham, AL

3. 16th Street Baptist Church, Birmingham, AL

4. Edmund Pettus Bridge, Selma, AL

5. Greyhound Bus Terminal, Anniston, AL

6. Little Rock Central High School, Little Rock, AR

7. Ebenezer Baptist Church (Heritage Sanctuary), Atlanta, GA

8. Monroe Elementary School, Topeka, KS

9. Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home, Jackson, MS

10. Robert Russa Moton High School/Museum, Farmville, VA  

11. Lincoln Memorial and Grounds, Washington, DC

The Department of Interior will work worth partners and consult with the Federal Interagency Panel for World Heritage before finalizing the nomination. The United States is also currently preparing the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge nomination in Georgia for possible inscription to the World Heritage List.

The ultimate decision on inclusion of the 11 Civil Rights Movement sites and Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge will be decided by the World Heritage Convention. If inscribed, the sites would become the United States' 26th and 27th World Heritage Sites, joining cultural and natural sites of universal importance around the globe. Most recently, the Hopewell Ceremonial Earthworks in Ohio was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in September of last year.

This week, the National Trust for Historic Preservation announced $3 million in grants through the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund. These grants will help support thirty sites across the country that are preserving Black history. This year's awardees also includes $1.2 million in grants through the Conserving Black Modernism program. This will help support eight sites that help promote and protect the work of Black architects.

The grants range from $50,000 to $155,000 and are broken down across four categories: capital projects, organizational capacity building, project planning, and programming and interpretation. In total the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund has made a total investment of $27 million, supporting 304 preservation projects across the country. These grants have permanently protected important sites of Black cultural heritage and in the process have helped tell a more complete American story.

Learn more about the program and check out the complete list of this year's recipients!

National Park Service: "Biden-Harris Administration Establishes Blackwell School National Historic Site as America's Newest National Park"

Michigan: "Historic Preservation Tax Credit Seeks $100 Million to Provide 'More Equitable' Restoration Across Michigan"

Virginia: "Governor Glenn Youngkin Announces $20 Million for Historic Preservation Capital Improvements Ahead of Nation’s Semiquincentennial"

Pennsylvania: "Prokopiak Measure to Increase Historic Preservation Tax Credit Program Becomes Law as Part of State Budget Package"

Florida: "Announcing the 2024 Florida's 11 to Save"