Conservation Easement Defense

A conservation easement is a voluntary deed restriction between a private landowner and a nonprofit land trust or government agency that ensures that a property will be conserved forever. Conservation easements are flexible tools that can allow a variety of uses to continue on the land but their overarching purpose is to protect the important public conservation values of a property in perpetuity. When a landowner chooses to protect their land with a conservation easement they create a public benefit that entitles them to various tax benefits.

However, despite the best intentions of conservation easement donors and a strong national land trust community, there are troubling signs that perpetuity may not always mean forever to some. The land conservation community is facing increasing challenges to the permanence of conservation easements. As more conserved lands change hands, sometimes new landowners, either out of ignorance or hubris, disregard easement restrictions and violate this perpetual protective covenant. In more extreme cases, the community has seen landowners taking legal action to challenge the conservation easements on their lands. Another threat comes from government agencies and utility companies who view conserved lands as a cheaper option when they consider condemning land for transmission corridors.

Defense of Place is committed to working with the conservation community to ensure that commitments made to protect private lands for the public benefit are upheld as they were intended. Defense of Place will work to defend conservation easement integrity in the following ways:

• We will help conservation-minded landowners choose the right land trust – one that shares their ideals and their commitment to protecting their land in perpetuity.
• We will act as a resource for individual land trusts and the land trust community on preventing and fighting conservation easement violations.
• We will help communities that find the public trust obligation of conservation easements being broken by easement holders or landowners in their area.
• We will create educational resources for the land trust community on conservation easement defense.

For more information on conservation easement defense contact Defense of Place Executive Director, Shannon Meyer (970) 963-0629. Another excellent resource for information on Conservation Easement Defense is the Land Trust Alliance.

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