“Get outdoors. Get off your iPad and get outdoors because it's way more fun and it's good for your brain.”

Our host, Marci Mowery, chats with Lutricia Eberly, the Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Outdoor Recreation Association (PORA), the trade group representing the state's ski resorts, outfitters, zip lines, and adventure providers.

Lutricia grew up on a tree farm in the woods, though neither of her degrees (computer science, then theology) pointed toward outdoor recreation. Almost by accident, she turned a seasonal job at Roundtop Mountain Resort into a career. It wasn't until she moved to Girl Scouts that she recognized outdoor recreation as an industry.

PORA began in 1978 as a ski association and rebranded in 2024 to represent the whole sector. Its advocacy work centers less on trails than on the unglamorous machinery behind them. These include utility costs (snowmaking is expensive!), minor-employment law, and safety training run jointly with the state's lift inspectors.

The association's most visible project is the Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass, a $69 digital pass for fourth and fifth graders that unlocks discounts at more than 50 providers statewide. Ski slopes, zoos, caves, and river outfitters are among them. These kids are old enough for real independence, but young enough that parents are still along for the ride.

Lutricia's case is that, more than a discount card, the pass is a counter against five-plus daily hours of screen time. It’s a low-stakes way for kids to try something unfamiliar and build confidence, and, eventually, a pipeline into outdoor careers kids don't yet know exist!

Key Topics:

• What PORA Actually Does (3:52)
• The Outdoor Adventure Pass, Explained (8:31)
• What the Pass Unlocks for Families (15:16)
• Showcasing Careers in Outdoor Recreation (18:05)
• Screens, Loneliness, and the Case for Getting Outside (22:43)

Resources:

• Pennsylvania Outdoor Recreation Association: https://paoutdoors.org/
• Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass: https://paoutdooradventure.com/
• @PaOutdoorPass on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/PaOutdoorPass
• PORA on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/pennsylvania-outdoor-recreation-association/

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When we talk about the Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass, we're talking about the value of that. Is it helps get kids off screens and outdoors because kids in that age range are spending five or more hours of entertainment screen time a day, and parents know that and they don't like it, but they're not quite sure what their options are or how to combat it. And so we're saying the Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass is that solution, that answer to get kids outdoors.

Imagine a place where stress fades, fresh air fills your lungs, and adventure awaits around every corner. Welcome to Think Outside, the podcast that inspires you to explore, connect, and embrace the outdoors. Welcome to Think Outside with the Pennsylvania Parks and Forest Foundation. I'm your host, Marci Maury. Today, I'm talking with someone who has spent much of her career helping people get outside in one way or another, Lutricia Eberle is the executive director of the Pennsylvania Outdoor Recreation Association, or PORA. She brings years of experience in the outdoor recreation industry, including leadership with Roundtop Mountain Resort and Girl Scouts in the heart of Pennsylvania. Today, she is helping lead PORA through an exciting evolution as it brings together outdoor recreation providers from across Pennsylvania, and I think Lutricia has a really interesting perspective on something we don't always think about. There's an entire industry working behind the scenes to help us have those outdoor experiences we value so much. So today we're going to talk about outdoor recreation as an industry, the people and businesses that make these experiences possible, the workforce that supports them, and what Pennsylvania can do to continue building a strong outdoor recreation culture. Lutricia, welcome to Think Outside. I'm really glad you're here.

Thank you, Marcy. Happy to be here.

So we we recently had an experience to talk on a podcast on the spark, we were talking about the same topic, the outdoor rec industry. But before we talk about Pora and the industry itself, I want to start with you. What is your personal connection to the outdoors, and how did that eventually lead you to the work that you're doing today?

Very intriguing question. I mean, I grew up in the woods as a child. That's where we grew up. I grew up on 30 acres. My dad was a truck farmer. My mom was a dairy farmer, and my dad was very passionate about trees. And so they actually planted our entire property with trees and put it in the Indiana Woodlands Conservation Association program, or whatever it was called. So, but at that time, like most of us, we had no idea that was going to be a career, and it and Roundtop just happened. I mean, I started as a seasonal employee there, and it turned into a year-round job. And Girl Scouts was when I began to realize that outdoor recreation was a career. When I was at Roundtop, it was about the ski industry, and that was my focus. And then, of course, sales. And so when I went to Girl Scouts, I was like, "Wait, outdoor recreation is a career. And then when I ended up in this job as the association executive director, I was like, "Holy smokes! My entire career has been outdoor recreation, and I had no idea. So it just was a natural evolution.

Yeah, and I think when I was looking at your LinkedIn profile, you didn't. Your college degree was not in anything related to what you're doing.

That's the classic story. Yes, yes, I have a bachelor's degree in computer science and a master's degree in theology. Neither has anything to do with outdoors. Yeah,

but I think it's good to point that out because sometimes people think that they're they're on this track and they have to stay on this track. But there are other opportunities,

and both of those were made perfect sense at the time. I mean, I was a I was really good at math. I am I'm not anymore, but I was really good at math and computer science and kind of the systems analysis all made sense. And at that time in my life, my faith was very important, so that next step made sense. Even though those are just really foreign right now, but

yeah, yeah. Well, we're glad you're doing what you're doing. I

love it. Thank you. Happy to be here.

So, for someone who isn't familiar with Pora, what is it, and what role does it play in Pennsylvania's outdoor recreation community?

We are a trade association serving outdoor recreation providers. So we are much like a manufacturers association or the Pennsylvania Bar Association. We're we're association serving our members, and so for us that means we're focused on advocacy, representing our members at the state capital, and workforce development, and then the Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass. How long has Beppo been in place? The ski association started in 1978, and in 2024 we became the Pennsylvania Outdoor Recreation Association because the ski areas kind of recognized naturally that a lot of their businesses had evolved to be year-round, and they wanted to represent the entire industry and bring their expertise to be a representative of the entire industry. Okay,

and how big is your association

right now? We're just about 50 members.

And so, what sort of things you mentioned advocacy? What sort of things would you be advocating for as it relates to outdoor recreation industry? A

lot of it has to do with utility costs and regulation, and also. Employment for minors, because a lot of the seasonal outdoor recreation businesses employ are the first job for a lot of people, and so some of those conversations are really important to us. And then anything about risk and liability. Okay,

utility costs were not what I was expecting you to say.

Yeah, that's the number one, and that's why the ski areas came together, and at the very beginning, there's a lot. There's a few cost involved with making snow on the East Coast.

Absolutely. I mean, once you said it, it made sense. I could you see the light bulb? I'm like, wow. Yeah, I believe you know advocacy is a big thing that you bring to the table. But what other things does Poro bring to the the table as an association versus individual businesses representing themselves, I

would say that there's two pieces, and the one that I really respect and admire when I came into it was the when we say workforce development, certainly it's about building awareness of careers in outdoor recreation, and that you know you can be in HR and outdoor recreation, you can be in graphics design, you can be in finance, but the really interesting nuance to me is that our training events are for the employees of our members, and so we run a lift maintenance training, a snowmaking training, and a risk management training. And I'm exploring doing an F and B training because all of those are, especially F and B and risk management, unique to outdoor recreation. And so when what we bring to the industry is a understanding of what it means to be in risk management. When you have employees that you train for a short period of time, and you have to get them to understand exactly what what matters in your industry, when you are F and B, when you're operating in three months, is a completely different experience than when you're operating a hotel year round. Yeah,

can you define FNB? Because to me, that's that's a bank.

Fair food and beverage.

Okay, food and beverage.

But where I was where I was going to circle around to is that the association is a continuing education provider with the Department of Labor and Industry, and we partner very closely with the Bureau of Occupational Industry Safety for our lift maintenance event because that department inspects the lifts, and so we have a really great relationship in which their inspectors and our lift mechanics come together for our training each year and make sure that we are meeting all of the ANSI code requirements that are required by law in Pennsylvania.

And that's so important because people want to have confidence when they're going skiing or they're taking part in any other type of outdoor recreation that it's going to be safe for them. And I imagine that you know some of these positions are seasonal, so getting seasonal staff up to speed in a short amount of time is very important.

And to respect that there are reasons for doing what you do, and like I said, I mean, now when it comes to lifts, you have to be 18 and older to run a lift in Pennsylvania. But there's lots of other positions at the ski resort that you potentially could be 15 or 16, and so for a young person's first job to understand why some of these things are a really big deal, that's a lot of training that goes into that,

we find the why is so important, even with our volunteers. What is the why behind what we're asking you to do? What is the why behind why you can't do something?

And when you only have an employee for three months and you're ramping up quickly and and conveying that why and how you weigh conveying how to do the job and the why, there there's a lot of nuances. That's a

skill. Yeah, that is definitely a skill. So you mentioned that you have the outdoor recreation pass. So for our listeners who may not have heard it about it before, what is the outdoor recreation pass?

It's the outdoor adventure pass.

I'm sorry, outdoor adventure. All right,

the Pennsylvania outdoor adventure pass is for fourth and fifth graders and gives them access to explore a whole heap of fun across the state of Pennsylvania. So what it is is there's over right now 50 providers. We call them providers or outdoor recreation locations on the pass, and so when a parent buys the pass for their child or a grandparent buys the pass for their child, they have access to get discounts at all of these locations across the state.

So when I was looking at the page for the pass, you know, it struck me fourth and fifth graders. Why was that the target audience?

There's a lot of reasons for that. So it started as the snow pass, ski pass for fourth and fifth graders, and that was a strategic choice because for skiing it was an age and a size in which kids could start to do the activities, and we realized that there's an important piece to that that we wanted to keep. So when you think about ziplining or you think about canoeing and kayaking, it's not to say you can't do something until you're in fourth and fifth grade, but it's an age where the child starts to have a little bit more control over their body. They're interested and willing to try things, and and they're still spending time with their families. Yeah, they haven't quite decided their parents aren't cool enough anymore.

Yeah, and also isn't the national park pass? They they have a target of fourth grade, so wonder if there's a similar reasoning behind it.

Yeah, exactly. I was just meeting with somebody yesterday, and she says, "Oh, she says my nephew just had the fourth grade pass. He's in fifth grade now. I'm going to recommend to his mom that he gets the adventure pass. So, what type of adventures could a. The family participate in well. The we have a couple zoos that are on the pass, caves are on the pass, of course the ski areas, but we also have right here in the Central Harrisburg area. Susquehanna Outfitters is on the Susquehanna River, and you can do canoeing, kayaking, and stand up paddleboarding. Blue Knob All Seasons Resort is a ski resort, actually in a state park, and they're one of our members as well. So climbing, mountain biking, zip lines, caves, trains, so much.

And I think I saw on the website it says $69 to acquire the pass, but you can get up to like $2,400 in values if you visit everything. So how does it work? So you you go online you order a pass what what does a person need to do in order to get that pass and then how do they you know redeem that pass when they're out visiting some of these locations?

It's a fully digital pass. So if a parent went online to buy it, they would need to upload a photo of their child, and that's how we verify a pass holder when they show up at a location, and then they upload proof of grade. So we're looking for, and it can just be a screenshot off your phone saying that your child is enrolled in fourth or fifth grade, and so that's how we're verifying the fourth and fifth grade status. And they sign a liability waiver. So at that point, they've made their purchase. It's a digital pass. I log in and approve that their fourth and fifth grade upload was accurate, and then they're free to go use it around the state. And so, it's an interactive Google Map on our website, and we encourage the parents to involve their child in that process of picking the adventures that they want to go on. And so, they would show up at that location, say, "Have a Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass. The location would pull them up on their website and verify by photo and click redeem and take that use off the pass. So the offer varies by location. I mean, one place might say free admission for the pass holder with parent purchase. Another place might say $5 off admission or 50% off admission. Okay.

So the offers vary, and that's all explained on the website. And I'm glad you clarified why the the child's photo is necessary? Because I was reading like, why do I have to upload a photograph? Yeah, so that's very helpful. What if a family wants to participate? How does that work?

Yeah, great question. So the whole family can go absolutely. That means that they're making it have a discount on the child now that has the fourth or fifth grade pass. Okay,

and if you have let's say you have twins or triplets. Is every child eligible as much as one per family?

Yes, yes.

And is this the first year that you've been doing the adventure pass? And is

technically we just crossed over into the second year.

Okay,

so the ski pass was stopped during COVID for a lot of reasons, and so we just picked this up back up last year. It expanded into the outdoor adventure pass.

And how long is the pass good? Is it a calendar year? Is it how does how does that work?

It's valid for one year, starting september 1 through august 31. And if you buy the pass, if you bought it on september 1, obviously have the full 365 days to use it. But if you didn't buy a pass until May, you could still take advantage of everything on the past, before it expired august 31, and then vice versa. If you bought the past september 1, and let's say three more providers joined in December, you would have access to them as well. So it's a fluid year long experience, and you can get the value out of the past. Sometimes just with one visit somewhere, or sometimes with two or three,

right? Depending on what you're doing. Is there an adventure that you've tried that's on the pass that is a memory for you.

I have tried lots of the adventures that are on the pass prior to the past. Okay. Yes, I mean I've skied at many of our resorts. I have canoed and kayaked. I have been to a couple of the zoos. So yes, I have done the adventures. I mean, anything skiing related is is standing out in my mind because that would be

wouldn't stand out for me.

My going all the way back to Roundtop, my better half and I have a goal of visiting as many ski areas as possible. So we visited 50 across Pennsylvania and Canada in the 15 years we've been together, so skiing stands out

for downhill skiing.

Yeah,

5050, That's pretty impressive.

Our 50th resort was Blue Knob All Seasons Resort.

Okay, yep. What type of feedback are you getting from both the participants as well as the destinations?

It's such wonderful feedback. It's been really great. Some of our providers are so appreciative of the fact that they don't have to pay to be on the pass; they just have to give us an offer, and so it works out. I mean, they're just tremendously appreciative of the fact that we're driving revenue to their doorstep, and it makes a real difference to them. And then the the families that have the pass have had so much fun exploring things that they say we never would have done otherwise. We had a mom the other day that went out with her kids, and and the weather forecast was maybe a little rainy, and she was questioning whether or not she still wanted to go out. And they did. They went to Pocono Whitewater, and they had the best time playing in the water. And she acknowledged that they probably would have stayed home. Otherwise, but because they had the pass, it kind of encouraged them to get out and have that adventure.

Yeah, I like that, and that was actually going to feed into my next question: Are you finding people are participating in things more because they have the pass, or trying things that they may not have tried before because of the pass?

Yeah, for sure, trying things they haven't tried before, and that's one of the other pieces that I like about the pass is that when you buy, when you sign your child up for any sport, you're committing them to a whole season of it. You're committing them to a season of basketball or a season of softball or even skiing. And with the adventure pass, you're letting them try a bunch of different things, and so they can try caves or they could go to a zoo and they can try skiing and they can try kayaking, but they're not committing to we've got to go seven times in order to get our kayaking money. We're this pass, but we can try different things.

The Pennsylvania is a pretty pretty big state when you start to drive it. So, are the locations geographically dispersed? So that if I'm up in Erie and I'm thinking about buying a pass,

yes and yes. So yes, the locations are dispersed across the state. There's a number of pockets. So if you wanted to go to Erie, yeah, there's two or three things you could do up there for a weekend. We're also encouraging people though to use it to travel across the state. So we are marketing the pass outside of Pennsylvania, and encouraging families to use that when they come here on vacation. Or if let's say you're a grandparent living in Pittsburgh, and you're going to have your kid, your grandkids, for two weeks over the summer. You could get the pass for them and go adventuring across the state with it. So yes, it's geographically dispersed. Some places have multiple activities in them, or multiple activities in that geographic location that you could combine together, and others are a little bit more spread out, and you'd have to make a plan for that. I

love that hook for grandparents, families, grandchildren are visiting, get the pass, have some adventures.

Yeah, absolutely. Even if a parent locally were to buy it, and then they wanted to go away for a weekend, they could say to the grandparents watching their kids, "Here's this adventure pass. Take, let's go have fun.

That's true because it's the child's picture. It's the child who has the past. You're just the. It

doesn't matter. You're the bonus. You're the

bonus adult going along. Shifting back to the outdoor recreation economy, the outdoor recreation environment. Who do you think isn't seeing themselves in the outdoor recreation area, and how is the past addressing that? Is it helping people who may not see themselves in the outdoor recreation arena participate. It

definitely is giving an umbrella to pull all the conversations together. I'm thinking of our businesses, and I couldn't say who doesn't see themselves there, but they're grateful to be able to join the association and be a part of a larger unified voice, and so one of our members up in the Poconos. As soon as we changed to be the Pennsylvania Outdoor Recreation Association from the Ski Association, they said we absolutely want to be a part of this because of your legislative and lobbying efforts. Like we want to be a part of this larger voice. So I have I'm not hearing that people didn't understand, but they're grateful to be a part of that larger conversation. And then one of my dreams in the future for the Adventure Pass is that we can take it from just getting kids outdoors to then showcasing careers in the outdoors, because when if they were to go to you know whitewater rafting or go kayaking, and to realize that they could be a guide on the river, or they could be the safety person, or they could be the graphics designer, and that's all within outdoor recreation. That's the story I want to work towards next.

Yeah, and that's an important story, and that's one that we try to tell as well. You might be an accountant, but there's there's space for you in the outdoor recreation industry to be an accountant. So they're not just park and rec professionals,

right?

There's a wide variety of careers that make up this industry.

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, my stepson was a whitewater guide, you know, and it's he's become an avid whitewater paddler because of you know that opportunity he had on the water and spends a lot of his time chasing water.

Yep,

he loves it when it rains. What changes do you think the outdoor recreation community needs to be thinking about now? Not five years from now, not 10 years from now, but now. You talked about the the cost of utilities. I mean, what sort of thing? What sort of challenges are they facing that that are important to be addressing at this point in time?

I think it just continues to come back to unification, you know. And you and I have crossed paths before, and we understand that message. But I think that there's a lot more out there that can be done to help us all understand. And and Pora's move from the ski association to outdoor recreation was almost the same exact time that Governor Shapiro created the Office of Outdoor Recreation. So that work is happening, but I think there's just a lot more conversation that needs to happen around that to bring it all together and help us understand how all of our work. And needs do come together, and then I would say also the jobs conversation is important for better for worse. Most of our members are doing okay with employees right now, but it's not going to be that way forever.

Right, right. You know, and I assume that you're representing very large employers to very small employees. Employers, so having that bigger network is is important to them, and having a voice.

And the other opportunity in outdoor recreation is how we can cohesively begin to share employees back and forth. You know, because we have the ski area employees, and then we have the summer operations employees. And in the outdoor recreation industry, we've talked about how seasonal employees' benefits don't carry over, and that's a reason that a lot of people choose to leave the industry. So there's lots of opportunities for conversation moving forward.

Yeah, we see that in the state park and state forest as well. Seasonal employment people need benefits, or they want to be employed year-round. So that's an interesting conversation to have. I'll be watching that. I want to see how you solve that problem. One other question, and then you know, like anything that you would like to to make sure that we our listeners understand about the work that you're doing in the outdoor adventure pass. We sometimes talk about the outdoors as though it's simply a place, a trail, a park, a business, but your work at the intersection of people, businesses, communities, and outdoor places. What do you think happens when all these pieces start to work together?

Oh, magic happens for sure, and I enjoy being on the business side of this, though. And it's not to say that the others aren't important, but most of my career has been focused in business development, and so that's what I love about the exact job that I have. But that's why the relationships and the diversities of conversation are so important. That there are people like the Parks and Forest Foundation that are doing the work that they're doing, and then there's people like the Office of Outdoor Recreation that's unifying some of the, I mean, the whole industry, but particularly unifying the government entities that all pertain to that. So, I forget what your original question was, but what happens when all these pieces come together? You said magic. I said magic. Yeah, being able to tell the story with a larger narrative, and you know, when we're all quoting, and I've heard you quote them, and I quote them all quoting the same statistics to say, you know, 177,000 jobs across Pennsylvania outdoor recreation. When we're all saying the same numbers, it begins to build that awareness that it's it's an entire industry that we're talking about here.

Yeah, and we also like to emphasize the the health benefits. You know that those are huge. You know, physical, mental, and emotional health, and then the cost savings that comes from having a healthier population of people.

That's something. Yeah, that's been a difficult one for me to begin to tell well because I take it for granted so much. Because I grow up understanding that, and when I'm having a bad day, I'm saying to my better half, tomorrow I've got to get out to Gifford Pinchot and go for a walk before I start my day. So that's a different. Thank you for bringing it up. It's hard for me to remember that message naturally,

but it's it's so important. And so many. We recently had a big event, and for so many of the participants, that was they just needed to to de stress, to come into themselves.

Yeah, and when we when we talk about the Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass, we're talking about the value of that. Is it helps get kids off screens and outdoors because kids in that age range are spending five or more hours of entertainment screen time a day, and parents know that and they don't like it, but they're not quite sure what their options are or how to combat it. And so we're saying the Pennsylvania Outdoor Adventure Pass is that solution, that answer to get kids outdoors. Again, that message for me was, I knew that growing up. That's how I lived my entire life, and to realize that parents don't feel like they know how to get kids outdoors has been a tremendous learning opportunity for me.

I think too at that age bracket that you're looking at, there's still an opportunity for somebody to maybe change a trajectory. You know, maybe finding a passion that they love, because I worry not only about the screen time, but about the isolation that comes with screen time. And you know, as they're as they're getting older, loneliness. You know, and I was reading a statistic recently that it's young men that are really struggling with loneliness, as well as seniors, because of this, there we're isolating ourselves with our our devices,

and so you highlight loneliness. I think about confidence to make decisions, and so when we're in the outdoors and we're faced with something that's a little bit different than anything we've dealt with on our screen, and then when we make that decision and find out that we can do it, we're kind of like standing up just a little bit straighter for ourselves, and we had another story of a couple young boys on the Susquehanna River kayaking, and they were brothers, so they were in that the kayak, and they maybe weren't, you know, going to be working together so much, but the team at Susquehanna Outfitters had seen that before, obviously, and they gave really great instructions that these two brothers were able. To start paddling and together in the right direction, and I just have to imagine when they went home that night that they just you know felt pretty good about what they'd figured out and how they'd accomplish that together and push through that fear because the current was carrying them the wrong direction and they needed to be going upriver. I don't know that they were aware of that, but those of us adults on the shore, kind of like you're like biting your nails. You're gonna notice, but the staff took such good care, just giving great instructions, and the and the boys got it together. That's awesome. Is there anything else that you would like to share about the work that you're doing, about the pass, anything that you have coming up? One of my other fun experiences was when we had an event and there was a young fifth grader that we invited to speak at the event because he was well spoken, at the end I could tell that he was going to be comfortable. I said, "Is there anything else you'd like to say? And he went up to that microphone and he said, "Get outdoors, get off your iPad, and get outdoors because it's way more fun and it's good for your brain. And I just thought, yep, that was a good call to give the child a microphone because he nailed

it. Yeah, sounds like a good T-shirt.

Yeah, right. Yeah.

Well, thank you for joining us today, and and we will link in the show notes where people can purchase the Adventure Pass, and also link to your your social media account so that people can follow you and learn more. And perhaps it's somebody that's has a business or is looking to start a business and would benefit from being a part of the network, the association.

That's right. Thank you, Marcy. Appreciate you having me on. Good to see you. Thank you.

Good to see you as well. Thank you for listening to Think Outside, where every episode invites you to discover new places, build confidence, and find inspiration in nature. Love the show? Subscribe for more inspiration. Share with a fellow explorer, and let's keep thinking outside together. For more resources and inspiration, visit thinkoutsidepodcast.org.