More Seats at the Campfire: Why Nature for MA Is About Access and Adventure

There are moments on the trail that stop me cold, and almost none of them are about me anymore. They're about watching my child react to something they're experiencing for the first time. It might be as small as crouching down to study a cluster of mushrooms growing out of a fallen trunk like it's the strangest, most wonderful thing they've ever seen. Or it might be as enormous as reaching a viewpoint and watching their face go quiet as an endless vista opens up in front of them. Nature has a way of entrancing, delighting, and leaving us in a kind of awe that nothing else in human experience quite replicates. Watching that awe take hold in my own child, and knowing I get to be the one who hands it to them, is one of the purest things I've ever been part of.

That's really the pursuit, passing this experience down from one generation to the next. And it's exactly why I believe it's our collective responsibility to make sure every family in Massachusetts — not just the ones who already have a car, a trailhead nearby, and gear in the closet — gets the chance to experience those same moments of awe.

Unfortunately, the incredible feeling of exploring our state’s forests and mountains isn't equally available to everyone in this state. For a lot of families, the backcountry might as well be on another planet. Maybe there's no car to get to the trailhead. Maybe the closest green space is an underfunded lot with no signage, no maintained paths, and no reason to feel welcome. Maybe nobody has ever handed their kids a pack, a pair of boots, or the confidence that the outdoors was theirs to explore too.

That gap is exactly what the Protect Water and Nature Ballot Initiative is built to close. Question 6 isn't just an environmental policy sitting in a binder. It's an invitation. By voting YES on 6 this November, Massachusetts voters can direct as much as $100 million a year, drawn from the existing sales tax already collected on sporting goods, toward protecting land and water and building the trails and parks that welcome everyone into the lifelong joy of outdoor adventure. No new tax —just a smarter use of the money we're already spending on the gear we love.

Human Resources & the Outdoors

I spend my professional life working in tech partnerships, and if there's one lesson that world has drilled into me, it's that growth doesn't happen by accident. It happens when you deliberately lower the barriers standing between people and opportunity, and then you build pipelines that actually deliver on that promise. Companies that win are the ones that make it easy for new talent to get in the door and easy for them to succeed once they're there.

The outdoor world needs that exact same strategy. Nature is arguably the most universal human resource we have. It's free once you're standing in it, it improves physical and mental health, and it builds the kind of resilience and perspective you can't get anywhere else. But like any resource, it only creates value if people can actually reach it. Right now, too much of Massachusetts' backcountry is functionally locked behind geography and economics.

A YES vote changes that math. Initiative funding is aimed directly at breaking down those barriers by building new urban-to-backcountry trail connections, improving access to green space, and making sure a lack of transportation or gear isn't the reason a kid never gets to crouch down over a cluster of mushrooms, or stand at a viewpoint and feel that same awe wash over them.

Funding the Next Generation of Adventurers

Let's get concrete about how this actually works, because the mechanics matter and they're refreshingly simple. Every time someone buys outdoor gear — a backpack, a kayak, a climbing harness, or a tent — a portion of the sales tax on that purchase already flows into the state's general fund, where it’s used to fund the state’s $63.4 billion annual budget. The ballot initiative doesn't raise that tax by a single cent. It simply redirects a share of that existing revenue into a dedicated Nature for All Fund for land and water conservation, with a public oversight board responsible for how the money gets spent.

Now imagine what happens when that funding actually hits the ground. Better maintained state parks. Safer, more accessible backcountry trail networks. And critically, expanded support for local communities to build parks and green space right where people already live, not just where people can afford to drive to. It turns something as ordinary as buying a new pair of hiking boots into a permanent, self-sustaining engine for outdoor equity. Every purchase becomes a small investment in someone else's first trip into the woods.

The Trek Isn't Finished Yet

The best adventures I've had were never solo. They were shared, and watching someone else feel that awe for the first time, especially my own child, is even better than feeling it myself. That's the vision behind this initiative: a Massachusetts outdoor community that looks like the whole state, not just the families who already had easy access.

We have a real, tangible chance to change who gets to experience the wild spaces of Massachusetts, from the Blue Hills to the Berkshires to the coast. The coalition behind the Protect Water and Nature Initiative  has already done the hard work of organizing, building support, and getting Question 6 in front of voters. Now it's on us, the people who already know what that awe feels like, to finish the trek.

Talk to your neighbors. Share this story with your hiking group, your gym, your kids' school. And when November comes, vote YES on Question 6: the Protect Water and Nature Initiative. Let's open the doors to the backcountry wide enough for everyone to walk through, and let's make sure there's always room for one more seat at the campfire.

About the Author

Sean Dazet is an AMC activist, an avid outdoor enthusiast, and a public speaker based in Newton, MA. Professionally, he manages strategic partnerships for an HR technology company. He is passionate about expanding diversity in outdoor spaces and inspiring the next generation of backcountry explorers.