| Last week Governor Shapiro’s Administration announced that Pennsylvania’s Kittatinny Ridge that spans from Fulton and Franklin counties to Schuylkill and Berks, and includes Fort Indiantown Gap, has been named as a Sentinel Landscape. This designation, made by the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Defense, and the Interior, creates a partnership between federal agencies, state and local governments, and non-governmental organizations to strengthen the region’s military readiness, conserve natural resources, support agriculture productivity, increase public access to outdoor recreation, and enhance resilience to climate change.
Fort Indiantown Gap is the busiest National Guard Training Center in the country, the U.S. Army’s second busiest heliport, and one of three specialized Army National Guard aviation facilities. With this designation, our servicemembers will continue to train in secure skies and on protected lands for decades to come. It also incentivizes sustainable solar energy usage along that region’s abandoned coal mining properties.
I’m glad to see this partnership in Pennsylvania for the benefit of our Armed Forces, our agriculture industry, and the protection of one of the most biodiverse regions in eastern North America.
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