GO Act

Guides and Outfitters Act or the GO Act

This bill amends the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act to specify the circumstances under which the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) may: (1) issue special recreation permits for federal recreational lands and waters, and (2) change a special recreation permit fee.

Interior and USDA may issue special recreation permits:

• for specialized individual and group use of federal facilities and federal recreational lands and waters;
• to recreation service providers who conduct outfitting, guiding, and other recreation services on federal recreational lands and waters; and
• to recreation service providers who conduct recreation or competitive events, which may involve incidental sales on federal recreational lands and waters.

USDA and Interior shall implement a program that authorizes temporary permits for new recreational uses of federal recreational lands and waters managed by the Forest Service or the BLM, respectively.

Interior and USDA shall revise certain:

• special land use and special recreation permit regulations to streamline the processes for the issuance and renewal of outfitter and guide special use permits, and
• cost recovery fee regulations to reduce costs and minimize the burden of cost recovery on small businesses and adverse impacts of cost recovery on jobs in the outfitting and guiding industry and on rural economies.