Counting Participation Is Not Enough: Outdoor Recreation Needs Better Outcome Measures
Outdoor recreation programs should be judged by what changes—not simply by how many people show up. As New Mexico increases investment in trails, youth access, workforce development, and outdoor businesses, the sector needs a common scorecard connecting public dollars to stronger businesses, better jobs, broader access, and healthier places.
New Mexico has reached the point where outdoor recreation must become more disciplined about measurement.
The state can already demonstrate substantial scale. Outdoor recreation contributed $3.6 billion to New Mexico’s economy in 2024 and supported 31,454 jobs. In FY26 alone, the Outdoor Recreation Division reported $15.1 million in grants, $13.4 million in matching funds, 186 funded projects and programs, 44,609 youth connected to the outdoors, more than 1,063 miles of trails created or improved, and 418 jobs supported. (New Mexico EDD)
Those are meaningful accomplishments. But most are still measures of activity.
The harder—and more useful—question is: what changed because of the investment?
That distinction is central to the All Forward Foundation’s No Margin, No Mission framework and the broader From Margin to Mission model. If outdoor recreation is going to be treated as serious economic and community infrastructure, it should be measured with the same discipline we expect from other industries.
Outputs Are Not Outcomes
Outdoor recreation is very good at counting things: miles of trail built, grants awarded, participants served, volunteer hours, certifications completed, events held, and visitors attracted.
Those measures tell us whether something happened. They do not necessarily tell us whether it worked.
A youth program can serve 100 participants without creating a single pathway to employment. A trail project can generate thousands of visits while nearby businesses capture little of the spending. A workforce program can issue certifications while employers continue struggling to fill jobs. A business grant can be completely spent while the recipient remains economically fragile.
None of those efforts is necessarily a failure. But participation and expenditure should not be confused with impact.
New Mexico is already moving in the right direction. The state’s newer Outdoor Equity Fund Tier 2 grants require applicants to demonstrate robust program evaluation and outcome-measurement practices. That is an important signal: as investment grows, expectations for evidence should grow with it. (New Mexico EDD)
No Margin, No Mission Requires Economic Measures
The first measure should be the one outdoor recreation sometimes avoids: economic health.
If a program is designed to strengthen outdoor businesses, then we should know whether those businesses became stronger. Did revenue grow? Did margins improve? Were jobs retained or created? Did the business extend its season, increase wages, invest in equipment, or become less dependent on owner sacrifice?
Santa Fe already applies this thinking to other economic-development investments. The City’s SPUR program explicitly looks for measurable outcomes such as revenue generation, job creation and retention, private investment, business resilience, and long-term competitiveness. Outdoor recreation is one of its targeted industries. (Santa Fe, NM)
Outdoor businesses should be held to serious measures—but they should also receive access to the same serious economic-development tools.
That is the practical heart of No Margin, No Mission. A business that remains financially fragile cannot reliably become a workforce partner, community-access provider, stewardship leader, or long-term employer.
Workforce Success Should End With Work
The same discipline applies to workforce development.
The useful question is not simply how many people completed training. It is how many entered paid work, stayed employed, increased their earnings, gained responsibility, and moved further along a career pathway.
Santa Fe’s Office of Economic Development identifies workforce development as a core priority and emphasizes work-based learning, apprenticeships, career pathways, employer alignment, and reducing barriers to meaningful employment. Outdoor recreation is also identified by the City as one of seven targeted industry sectors. (Santa Fe, NM)
The infrastructure is increasingly aligned. The opportunity now is to establish common outcomes across organizations instead of allowing every program to define success differently.
A useful workforce metric should be able to answer a simple question six or twelve months later: What is this person now able to do that they could not do before?
Access Should Measure What Happens After the First Experience
Equity programs face a similar challenge.
The number of young people who get outside matters. New Mexico’s Outdoor Equity Fund has connected more than 128,000 youth across 28 counties and Tribal communities since its launch. (New Mexico EDD)
But deeper measurement should examine what follows that first experience.
Did participants return to the outdoors? Did their families gain greater confidence using public lands independently? Were transportation or equipment barriers reduced? Did participants enter another program, earn a certification, accept an internship, join a conservation corps, or take an outdoor job? Did the organizations serving them develop greater long-term capacity?
Access becomes more durable when the outcome is not simply a day outside, but a stronger relationship between people, opportunity, and place.
Stewardship Needs Measures Beyond Volunteer Hours
Stewardship is often measured by effort: bags of trash collected, volunteers recruited, hours contributed, or acres treated.
Those measures are useful, but the real outcome is the condition of the resource.
Are trails holding up better? Are river access points cleaner? Is erosion declining? Are maintenance backlogs improving? Are visitors behaving more responsibly? Are land managers gaining capacity rather than simply receiving occasional volunteer assistance?
This matters because recreation growth creates pressure as well as benefit. In FY26, New Mexico’s outdoor investments supported more than 1,063 miles of trails created or improved. As infrastructure expands, measurement should follow the entire lifecycle—from construction to maintenance to long-term resource condition. (New Mexico Outdoor Recreation Division)
Santa Fe Needs a Shared Outdoor Economy Scorecard
Santa Fe is well positioned to lead this work. Outdoor recreation is already a targeted City industry alongside tourism and hospitality, while the City’s economic-development priorities include business development, workforce development, ecosystem building, economic mobility, and strategic asset development. (Santa Fe, NM)
What is missing is a simple shared scorecard connecting those priorities.
A regional outdoor-economy dashboard could measure five dimensions: economic health through business survival, revenue, jobs, wages, and locally retained spending; workforce through paid placements, retention, credentials, and wage progression; access through repeat participation and barriers removed; stewardship through resource condition and maintenance; and system strength through partnerships, referrals, leveraged investment, and successful handoffs between programs.
Other communities have demonstrated the value of going beyond visitation. Research on Montana’s Whitefish Trail measured not only use, but local spending, labor income, jobs, resident participation, and quality-of-life effects. Researchers estimated $6.4 million in annual spending associated with the trail, supporting 68 additional jobs and $1.9 million in labor income. (Headwaters Economics)
That tells decision-makers considerably more than trail mileage alone.
Key Takeaways
Participation measures tell us what happened; outcome measures tell us whether it mattered.
As New Mexico’s outdoor-recreation investment grows, expectations for evidence should grow with it.
No Margin, No Mission means business health must be measured alongside access, workforce, and stewardship goals.
Workforce programs should track paid employment, retention, wages, and advancement—not training completion alone.
Santa Fe could strengthen its outdoor economy by adopting a small shared scorecard across businesses, government, workforce organizations, funders, and community partners.
What’s Next
Santa Fe does not need another major planning exercise to begin.
Bring a small group of outdoor businesses, workforce organizations, youth partners, land managers, tourism leaders, funders, and economic-development representatives together. Agree on ten or twelve measures that matter across the system. Establish a baseline. Review the data twice a year. Then use the results to decide where the next dollar, program, or partnership should go.
The objective is not measurement for its own sake.
It is better decisions.
When we can see which investments strengthen businesses, create durable jobs, expand meaningful access, and improve the places we depend on, we can stop funding activity and start scaling what works.
