A big day for the Valley and for the Shenandoah National Park as President Bush visits our area. The president was here to talk about giving federal funding for the National Park System.

The White House picked the park in our area because it was close to Washington, D.C. and because the Shenandoah National Park could receive a large portion of federal money.

Big Meadows, that's where President Bush announced his proposed budget for the National Park Service, and it was good news for Shenandoah National Park. It would receive $1.6 million. President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush landed in Marine One at Big Meadow in Shenandoah National Park just before Noon Wednesday.

Bush announced his National Parks Centennial Initiative which aims to generate up to three billion dollars over 10 years. "Our national parks are one of America’s great and the question is, are we going to be wise enough to keep them as such," says President George Bush. The money would come from a combination of public and private money. Bush says the federal government would match money raised in the private sector up to a billion dollars.

"Our parks will have its hundredth anniversary in 2016 and we felt like a vital goal for this country would be to prepare those parks, to guard the parks, to conserve the parks, to make the parks relevant to the American people in honor of the hundredth anniversary," says Bush.

Shenandoah National Park officials expressed the decrease in visitation the park has seen over the past 10 years, but with the $1.6 million set aside in the president's budget, the park would have the funds needed to change that.

Now, it's in the hands of congress to give the National Park Service its largest-ever funding increase. "Congress needs to hear loud and clear how important this initiative is, and I fully hope the citizens groups who are concerned about the parks be a hasty trail to the Congress and remind the congress about what we have done and what we need to do," says Bush.

Congress is expected to make a decision as soon as next week for a budget on our National Park Service.