It was built by President Franklin Roosevelt’s Civilian Conservation Corps ( CCC ), a New Deal programme that put some 3m men to work building infrastructure and parks during the Great Depression.
Now “Roosevelt’s Tree Army”, as the corps was called, may be getting a 21st-century makeover.
President Joe Biden, who has not been coy about his admiration for FDR or his desire to emulate the New Deal, wants to fund a new version of the CCC aimed at tackling climate change and its effects.
Mr Biden’s Civilian Climate Corps would be funded by the $1.7trn “Build Back Better” bill that lawmakers are haggling over.
Each year between 1,400 and 1,800 people serve in Colorado’s conservation corps.
Still, half of Americans under 45 surveyed by Data for Progress, a left-leaning pollster, said they would consider working in a climate corps.
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