This Land, Your Land

President Barack Obama wants to hear from you about how to "reconnect Americans, especially children, to America's rivers and waterways, landscapes of national significance, ranches, farms and forests, great parks, and coasts and beaches."

The America's Great Outdoors Initiative is meant to develop a 21st century strategy for America's great outdoors, and is gathering information through a series of public meetings, one of which is in Asheville on July 15.

The hearing at Asheville-Buncombe County Technical Institute, at 340 Victoria Road, will run from 1 to 4 p.m. Thursday.

Representatives from the Department of the Interior, Department of Agriculture, Environmental Protection Agency and the Council on Environmental Quality will be at the meeting to "hear your thoughts and to participate in a conversation with you about land conservation, recreation and reconnecting Americans to the great outdoors," information from the Initiative says.

You have to pre-reguister by Monday to speak; get details here.

The Initiative its to present the President with an action plan by November 15 and follow-up reports about the plan's implementation in September of 2011 and 2012.