All funds donated to the Statewide Land Conservation Program are distributed on a competitive basis to projects throughout Georgia.  Funds are matched with dollars from landowners, cities, counties and non-profit organizations to permanently preserve sensitive tracts of land with high conservation value.  Thus far, the program has utilized tax checkoff proceeds to help protect 31,414 acres at a cost of only about $11 per acre!  That’s pretty good leverage and a great return on the taxpayer’s investment.

Through their checkoff donations, taxpayers can help leave a legacy of natural lands for generations to come by giving to the Statewide Land Conservation Program.  So fill in the Land Conservation Program box on your 2010 tax form and give until it hurts!

To review a list of all 317 checkoff and non-checkoff funded projects, as well as the more than 212,000 acres preserved through the program since 2005, please view the Endorsed Projects tab of the GLCP website:  www.glcp.ga.gov.  Visit www.checkoffgeorgia.org for more information on the income tax donation option.

The Rivermont conservation easement protects a natural riparian hardwood buffer on each side of 700 feet of a perennial stream that flows to the bio-diverse Chattahoochee River, providing important water quality protection for communities downstream.

 

JOHNS CREEK, Ga. – A diverse community of more than 900 homeowners came together to protect a 27.4 acre park on the Chattahoochee River with a conservation easement.  The conservation easement will protect the neighborhood park — and the natural beauty, crucial water quality, and wildlife and fisheries habitat on one of the south’s most bio-diverse watersheds.

The Rivermont Community Association made official the conservation easement agreement with Georgia Land Trust on Dec. 20, when the signed agreement was filed at the Fulton County courthouse. The agreement protects in perpetuity the neighborhood’s Chattahoochee riverside park from development.

The forested park located off Barnwell Road is a natural picnic area on a picturesque bend in the Chattahoochee River. With easy access to the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area and the walking trails of the Jones Bridge National Recreation Area, the Rivermont Park has long been a favorite family gathering spot for residents of the 920-member Rivermont community. Amid the bottomland hardwood and mixed pine-oak-hickory forest, the park has a canoe launch, barbecue grills, exercise stations, a children’s playground and picnic tables and park benches.

More than the required 66.7 percent of the homeowners voted yes to the conservation easement agreement, as co-owners of the park, said Janet Busse, board of directors member and park chairman, who initiated the conservation easement project.

The conservation easement is a legal agreement between a landowner (easement donor) and a qualified conservation organization (easement holder) in which the owner voluntarily agrees to restrict the type of development that can occur on the land. A conservation easement agreement allows the landowner to preserve the property’s conservation and historic values, as defined by federal tax code, while allowing for traditional land use patterns, which in this case are scenic and recreational.

In a conservation easement agreement, the landowner retains ownership of the property, but “donates” the development value as a conservation easement donor to a land trust. As holder of the conservation easement, Georgia Land Trust documented the land’s current status in an 85-page baseline documentation report and will monitor the easement at least annually to assure compliance with the easement’s restrictions.

Conservation easement donations can reduce estate, income and property taxes for the landowner, but tax incentives were not the primary driver for the Rivermont Community Association.

“Rivermont is a subdivision that wants our park to remain a green space as opposed to it being developed,” Busse said.

She said the Rivermont community subdivision was incorporated in 1974 as an eco-friendly neighborhood. As the subdivision was developed with single-family homes, condominiums and cluster homes, structures were situated with an eye toward minimal footprints and tree cutting, “largely leaving a canopy of trees intact on the lots.”

The accomplishment of protecting the park belongs to “Rivermont homeowners who voted to give up the prospect of commercial development of this property in favor of keeping it in its very beautiful natural state, and to the board of directors who have supported the project from its inception,” said 14-year Rivermont community resident John Kohler, who is a former board of directors member and former park chairman.

The project to protect the neighborhood park with a conservation easement began in late spring of 2009 by Busse, who soon found Georgia Land Trust’s Josh Holmes, program director for Alabama and northwest Georgia for the state-certified land trust.  Holmes answered questions and guided the group through the process. After the Rivermont board approved of the idea of the conservation easement, a town hall meeting was held, which Holmes attended.

A committee including Busse, Kohler, Shirlee McKinnon, Bob Ayers, Holly Hollister, Jim Medlin and Herb Schall worked to get the vote in after ballots were mailed out.

“Over 50 percent of the votes came in on the first mailing of the ballot. After that, Shirlee, Holly, John and I collected ballots at entrances in high heat and eventually spent weekends walking door to door to collect ballots from those who forgot to mail them in,” Busse said.

At the conservation easement agreement signing were Rivermont Community Association board members and a Georgia Land Trust representative. From left are Jim Medlin, board president Marvin Hoeflinger, Josh Holmes of Georgia Land Trust, board secretary Janet Busse, Shirlee McKinnon and Holly Hollister.

Kohler gives credit to the “unfailing commitment of Janet Busse, our current park chair,” for the conservation easement becoming reality.

 “Many of us thought this would be a good idea, but it took true dedication, dogged determination, and many days of going door to door to actually secure the votes needed to make it a reality. Janet did the research, drew up a plan of action and corralled and prodded all of us who shared this goal to make it happen,” Kohler said. “Our park is a very special place. I am proud of our community for taking this step.”

Georgia Land Trust Executive Director Katherine Eddins said the Rivermont Community Association may be the largest group of landowners to come together to do one conservation easement with Georgia Land Trust. “That and the beauty of this park and the importance of this watershed make this conservation easement special,” Eddins said. “The easement protects more than 1,500 feet of frontage on the Chattahoochee River, which is a high priority and bio-diverse watershed, plus about 700 feet of streamside frontage, protection that benefits the entire community, county and state with improved water quality, and wildlife and fisheries habitat.”

Kayakers paddle the Tensaw River, part of the Alabama Scenic River Trail

 At 1,000 miles (and growing), the Alabama Scenic River Trail is the longest scenic river trail in a single state. But there’s more to the trail than recreation. ASRT is reconnecting communities with their rivers in ways that makes life better for everyone. Members are working to provide the essential fuel points that will allow powerboat tourism into Alabama’s interior. ASRT is working to clean our rivers and to help river cities provide access by boat to exciting downtown culture and amenities. In addition, the group is working to put a campground every ten miles along the trail and to promote small businesses that depend on tourism and hospitality along our rivers. Most of all, ASRT is working to make river tourism a source of clean, sustainable Alabama jobs. And, they are working to make it all happen safely.

Learn more about Alabama Scenic River Trail, campsites, day trips and how to support this important work, at www.alabamascenicrivertrail.com.

Alabama Scenic River Trail's river trails include the Alabama River, seen here at the historic Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma

Conservation-minded landowners now have until December 31, 2011 to take advantage of a significant tax deduction for donating a voluntary conservation agreement to permanently protect important natural or historic resources on their land.  When landowners donate a conservation easement to Georgia Land Trust or Alabama Land Trust, they maintain ownership and management of their land and can sell or pass the land on to their heirs, while foregoing future development rights. 

The enhanced incentive applies to a landowner’s federal income tax.  It:

• Raises the deduction a donor can take for donating a voluntary conservation agreement from 30% of their income in any year to 50%;
• Allows farmers and ranchers to deduct up to 100% of their income; and
• Increases the number of years over which a donor can take deductions from 6 to 16 years.

“Our whole community wins when thoughtful landowners conserve their land this way, protecting wildlife habitat, clean drinking water, scenic landscapes, recreational spaces, and productive agricultural lands,” said Katherine Eddins, executive director of Georgia Land Trust and Alabama Land Trust. “Conservation agreements have become an important tool nationally for protecting our watersheds, farms and forests, increasing the pace of private land conservation by a third – to over a million acres a year

According to the Land Trust Alliance, the national organization that provides a voice for land trusts in Washington, DC, bills to make this incentive permanent have 274 House and 41 Senate co-sponsors from all 50 states, including majorities of Democrats and Republicans in the House. This legislation is supported by more than 60 national agricultural, sportsmen’s, and conservation organizations.

To learn more about the enhanced incentive visit: www.galandtrust.org or www.lta.org/easementincentive.

Noble Hall in Auburn, historic home and 100 acres are protected by an Alabama Land Trust conservation easement

Located on Shelton Mill Road in Auburn, Noble Hall was constructed between 1852-1854 on a 2,000-acre plantation. Dr. Pearson recently preserved 100 acres of land and the structure in a conservation easement held by Alabama Land Trust, ensuring that the land and home will be preserved for generations.

Dr. Pearson, an author, former English professor, and granddaughter of a former Auburn University president Dr. Luther Noble Duncan for whom Noble Hall is named, is an Alabama Land Trust conservation easement donor and supporter. She makes her home in historic Noble Hall and often hosts heritage and historic preservation events there.

According to the National Register, Noble Hall is a Greek Revival rock and mortar house built by Addison Frazer (1809-1873) between 1852 and 1854 and served as the center for a 2,000 acre cotton plantation. Frazer was on the Board of Trustees of Auburn Masonic Female College and East Alabama Male College. Noble Hall has eight rooms with 12 foot high ceilings and 18 inch exterior walls, two cantilever balconies and eight Doric columns. In the rear are the original separate kitchen, carriage-smokehouse and overseer’s house. The Frazer family owned the house until 1922.

In 1932, J. V. Brown, Head of Buildings and Grounds at Alabama Polytechnic Institute, now Auburn University, bought the house and began restoration. In 1941, he sold it and 251 acres to Dr. Luther Noble Duncan (1875-1947), who served as president of A.P.I. (1935-1947). In 1943 his daughter, Elizabeth Pearson (Mrs. Allen M.), and family occupied the house and continued restoration. Mrs. Pearson inherited the house in 1951, collected its furnishings and named it Nobel Hall. In 1972 it was the first building in Lee County to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Please check it out.

http://www.romelibrary.org/video.html

Filming a segment of Southern Exposure are, from left, videographer David Evans, Katherine Eddins, Stephen Stutts and show host Lisa Smith

Executive director Katherine Eddins and board of directors president Stephen Stutts — plus two local physicians who own land protected by conservation easements held by Georgia Land Trust — were interviewed for the program, which will air at 7:30 p.m. ET each weekday Nov. 22-26 on Comcast Channel 4 in the Rome, Ga., area. In addition, after airing, the video of the program will be available for view on the Rome, Ga. Library website http://www.romelibrary.org/c4.htm

Southern Exposure host Lisa Smith and videographer and editor David Evans filmed the segment on location at conservation easement property owned by Stutts.

Dr. Ken Davis is interviewed on conservation easements, which he says are sometimes misunderstood. "A conservation easement can be a way to save a family farm."

The filming included interviews with Dr. Ken Davis and Dr. Mike Ware, both conservation easement donors with Georgia Land Trust. The Floyd County physicians talked about why they decided to protect their land with conservation easements. Davis, a former board member for the land trusts, was one of the first conservation easement landowners with Georgia Land Trust — and founding organization Chattowah Open Land Trust — in Floyd County. The Floyd, Chattooga, Dade and Walker counties area in northwest Georgia boasts the highest concentration of Georgia Land Trust-held conservation easements in Georgia.

Landowner and conservation easement donor Dr. Mike Ware prepares for interview with Evans and Smith.

The segment will air Thanksgiving week, and look for a copy to be posted here on our blog and on the website at galandtrust.org in the coming weeks.

Maritime forest and coastal hammocks and tidal marshes are conserved in the new conservation easement to be held and monitored by Georgia Land Trust.

Plum Creek voluntarily donated this easement which will provide permanent, natural habitat throughout the Jelks Pasture area for high-priority species and ecosystems as defined by the Georgia Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategy. The company, which will continue to own the land, has agreed to protect its ecological, recreational and historic values and to keep it in an undeveloped state. As the easement holder, Georgia Land Trust will monitor the property to ensure the established conditions of the easement are met. 

“Plum Creek has a strong history of conservation, and we are pleased to partner to conserve this environmental treasure for the benefit of public interest and enjoyment,” said Jim Kilberg, senior vice president of real estate for Plum Creek.  “By partnering with Georgia Land Trust, the Georgia Conservancy and a number of other public and private partners, we will protect this special place for the enjoyment of generations to come.”

 Plum Creek, which owns more than 350,000 acres in Coastal Georgia and 28,600 acres in Liberty County, has committed more than 1.3 million acres of lands to conservation outcomes across the country.

“This Plum Creek conservation easement–with its size, environmental values and sheer beauty–is an example of a company successfully balancing the need for community growth with the need to protect the most fragile of natural resources,” said Katherine Eddins, executive director of Georgia Land Trust. “The benefits of this conservation easement–cleaner water and air, soil quality, enhanced wildlife and fisheries habitat in healthy watersheds–extend beyond the boundaries of the protected land and provide everlasting, measureable value to people and communities.

At the announcement of the Plum Creek-Georgia Land Trust conservation easement were from left, John McIver, chairman of the Liberty County board of commissioners, Katherine Eddins, Georgia Land Trust executive director, Pierre Howard, president of the Georgia Conservancy, and Jim Kilberg, senior vice president for real estate for Plum Creek.

The Georgia Land Trust safeguards watersheds, soil and water quality, and wildlife habitat across more than 102,000 acres through easements on private lands across the state of Georgia.

Josh Holmes of Alabama Land Trust, second from right, carries a cooler full of Alabama Rainbow mussels as a volunteer for the Alabama Aquatic Diversity Center's reintroduction project on Choccolocco Creek Sept. 30 near Talladega. Photo from The Birmingham News website.

Holmes, other volunteers and biologists from the Marion, Ala.-based state-sponsored biodiversity center carefully planted 1,300 penny-sized and number-and-color-coded mussels among rocks and pebbly sand on the bottom of Choccolocco Creek in northeast Alabama. Another 300 gastropods were planted upstream by other volunteers. In addition to the large collection of Alabama Rainbow mussels, the center also brought along for planting into the creekbed some fine-lined pocketbook mussels, Alabama creek mussels and rough-horn snails.

The mussels and snails were cultured at Alabama Aquatic Biodiversity Center as part of a recovery effort aimed at saving and restoring dozens of endangered aquatic species and restoring the quality of state waters.

Center director Dr. Paul Johnson points out that mussels are natural water filters, which filter out bacteria and organic matter from passing water, and snails eat on biofilm, bacteria and algae.

Alabama Rainbow mussels were numbered and color coded to help with identification after the reintroction into Choccolocco Creek. Photo from The Birmingham News website.

Alabama Land Trust is collaborating with the center in the reintroduction, survey and monitoring of the mussels and other gastropods in Choccolocco Creek, where Alabama Land Trust protects more than 780 acres in the watershed and more than 10 miles of actual creek footage. Having land in the Choccolocco Creek watershed which is permanently protected with conservation easements helps with the success of the mussel and snail reintroductions and survival. Land protected by conservation easements provides large riparian buffers that safeguard water quality and habitat and prohibit floodplain development. Eventually, Alabama land Trust will coordinate with the aquatic biodiversity center on making protected land available for gastropod surveys and monitoring and any future mussel and snail reintroductions.

Volunteers plant mussels in Choccolocco Creek. Photo from The Birmingham News website.

Read and see more about the Alabama Aquatic Diversity Center’s efforts and this week’s activities in articles in The Birmingham News, at: http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2010/10/mussels_returned_to_alabamas_c.html,

and The Anniston Star, http://www.annistonstar.com/

See more pictures from The Birmingham News gallery at his link: 

http://photos.al.com/4461/gallery/alabama_rainbow_mussels_introduced_to_choccolocco_creek/index.html

Honored for their service to the land trusts were Scott Wiggers, who is moving to Mississippi to join the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Sonja Wallen, who is joining another non-profit in Savannah full-time, and Frank McIntosh, who retired from the land trust and became executive director of the Savannah’s Bicycle Campaign this year but still writes and helps produce the land trusts’ newsletter. Joining the staff recently is Leslie Horne, who is a staff attorney and will do other conservation work from the Georgia Land Trust office in Savannah.

During the trip, the staff also visited with members of the Fort Stewart, Ga. natural resources staff, our partners in the Army Compatible Use Buffer program and saw some impressive longleaf pine restoration areas and beautifully-managed mature longleaf areas which are home to red-cockaded woodpeckers.

In recognition of excellent service, plaques of appreciation were presented to departing staff members at a recent Georgia Land Trust and Alabama Land Trust staff gathering in Savannah. Pictured with executive director Katherine Eddins, center, are Scott Wiggers, GLT’s coordinator for the Army Compatible Use Buffer program at Ft. Stewart, who is leaving the land trust to join the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Frank McIntosh, former program director who remains part of the land trusts as newsletter writer and communications consultant, and Sonja Wallen, former administrative assistant at the GLT office who is leaving to work elsewhere, full-time, in the non-profit field.

Staff members of Georgia Land Trust and Alabama Land Trust gather in front of our Savannah office for a rare all-together picture. Pictured are, from left, development director Jackie Walburn, stewardship director Stephen Kirk, program director and staff attorney Leslie Horne, deputy director Mark Pentecost, bookkeeper Luanne Young, departing ACUB coordinator Scott Wiggers, Alabama and northwest Georgia land management director Josh Holmes, executive director Katherine Eddins, administrative assistant Jamie Williamson, CVLT program director Marc Hudson and Northwest Georgia land management director and staff attorney Justin Parks.

Tim Beaty of Fort Stewart's natural resources team shows us mature longleaf pine marked to show red-cockaded woodpecker cavity

Among the longleaf with Tim Beaty of Fort Stewart, were, from left, staff members Mark Pentecost, Marc Hudson, Josh Holmes, Leslie Horne, Jamie Williamson, Stephen Kirk and Justin Park