2023 New York Land Conservation Conference

Considerations for and the siting of land use areas is a critical step to ensure that an agricultural conservation easement permanently protects not only the land but also its future agricultural viability as well.  This pre-conference seminar will introduce guiding principles addressing long-term viability of a farm operation’s use of the land to be protected, review three farmland protection projects to illustrate how the landscape context of the lands being protected was considered in the designation or reservation of use areas (including building envelopes) and provide comments and insights on those site plans submitted by seminar participants prior to the conference.

Instructors:

• David Behm, farmland protection program manager, NYS Department of Agriculture and Markets (NY)

• Terence Duvall, agriculture and climate programs manager, Columbia Land Conservancy (NY) 

• Ben Gajewski, executive director, Genesee Valley Conservancy (NY) 

• Erin Hoagland, director of conservation, Dutchess Land Conservancy (NY) 

The Witness to Injustice / KAIROS Blanket Exercise™ has been inspired by KAIROS of Canada, was redesigned and is facilitated by a Team of Haudenosaunee people and their Allies from Neighbors of the Onondaga Nation (NOON). We work together teaching and learning as we go, paving a path as we tell the truth about the untold history of this part of the world. The Witness to Injustice facilitators are teachers, community organizers, professors, musicians, activists and neighbors, all dedicated to raising awareness of Indigenous sovereignty and the true history of the attempted genocide of the original peoples of this land. This unique three-hour interactive group teaching tool uses participatory education to foster truth, understanding and respect between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in the part of the world now known as the United States; especially in the territory stewarded by people of the Onondaga Nation and other Haudenosaunee peoples. When done in person, blankets cover the floor, representing the various Indigenous Nations of this continent (Turtle Island).  The Exercise helps participants deepen their understanding about the European colonization of Turtle Island and the denial of Indigenous peoples’ nationhood and the (many times illegal) acquisition of land throughout U.S. history up to present time. After the exercise, facilitators share resources to foster continued learning and participants have the opportunity to share with the group what they learned and felt.

Instructors:

• Cindy Squillace, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise, Neighbors of Onondaga Nation (NOON)

• Hazel Powless, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Jack Manno, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Awhenjiosta Myers, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Freida Jacques, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Maureen Lyons, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Buffy Curtis, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Liseli Haines, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Curtis Waterman, coordinator, Witness to Injustice/KAIROS Blanket Exercise

• Jessica Watson, conservation communities director, Open Space Institute

Join Rensselaer Land Trust and the Department of Environmental Conservation for a field trip of an 82-acre parcel that was acquired to protect the Tomhannock Reservoir, a drinking water supply for more than 45,000. The field trip will discuss unique features of the land, how the project was identified, partnerships created and the funding source that supported the acquisition: The Water Quality Improvement Project grant program.

Pre-registration is required as there are limited spots available and attendees may be responsible for their own transportation. The destination is approximately a 45-minute drive from the Hilton. 

Land trusts across New York are collaborating with their local Partnerships for Regional Invasive Species Management to enhance the conservation values on lands they protect and steward by controlling invasive species. Controlling invasive species can also ensure our forests sequester more carbon and help contribute to meeting NY’s ambitious climate goals. Land trusts are doing important research into beech leaf disease in Long Island and Westchester County and fighting forest pests in the Catskills and Adirondack foothills. In this workshop you will learn more about invasive species and forest pests, the PRISM network and how land trusts engage in this work from the Capital Region and Adirondack PRISMs, the Huyck Preserve and the Lake George Land Conservancy. Come with your questions about invasive species and share your experience helping to prevent, monitor and manage them.

Instructors:

• Tammara Van Ryn, Adirondack Park invasive plant program director, The Nature Conservancy (NY) 

• Kristopher Williams, Capitol-Mohawk PRISM coordinator, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Saratoga County (NY)  

• Monica Dore, conservation project manager, Lake George Land Conservancy (NY) 

• Anne Rhoads, executive director, Huyck Preserve (NY) 

For nearly two decades, social media has been an invaluable asset for nonprofits to evolve the way they communicate, and many of us have invested years of our professional lives honing our social media skills to increase our reach online. But lately, those tried and true strategies don’t seem to be working, the audiences you’ve amassed don’t seem to be engaging with posts. It’s not just you. Everyone is seeing it because the platforms are rotting. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok have gotten us this far, and while it’s not yet time to say goodbye, it’s definitely time to consider deprioritizing your social strategy – and imagining what you could do instead. Join Bold Bison for a thought-provoking session where we’ll explore what’s changing on social media; evaluate strategies to lighten the load of account management; and consider new ideas to rebuild community with our audiences in a post-social media world.

Instructors:

• Patrick Williams, director of creative services, Bold Bison Communications & Consulting (IL) 

• Brandon Hayes, founder and principal, Bold Bison Communications & Consulting (IL) 

This session will go into detail about the creation of the Otisco Shores Conservation Area, the first new park in Onondaga County in over 20 years.  The project incorporated a host of partners and included acquisition of a unique property, a large-scale native buffer planting project with the Onondaga Earth Corps, as well as trail improvements for the local community. Then, we’ll go over the details of the Water Quality Improvement Project grant program administered by NYS DEC, specifically the Land Acquisition for Source Water Protection project type, which helped to fund this conservation project.

Instructors:

• Max Heitner, director of conservation, Finger Lakes Land Trust (NY)

• Kristin Martinez, environmental program specialist, NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (NY) 

Land trusts are increasingly looking to organizational mergers as a way to sustain (or grow) their mission into the future. Hear from land trust staff, attorneys and a donor as they discuss the process for deciding if a merger is right for you, how to prepare a plan of merger, what to look out for in merging finances and conservation assets and how to work with the Attorney General’s office to get over the finish line.

Instructors:

• Chris Jage, conservation program director, Adirondack Land Trust (NY) 

• Ben Burge, partner, Rupp Pfalzgraf LLC (NY)  

• Bob Canace, senior program officer, The Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation (NY) 

• Catherine Rawson, executive director, Northwest Connecticut Land Conservancy (CT) 

New York has set ambitious targets for deploying solar energy to address climate change, and local communities and land trusts are wrestling with the impacts of solar development. As land-use conflicts increase, agrivoltaics has been getting a lot of interest. However, there are few operational examples of cattle-grazing and crop agrivoltaics in the U.S. Given urgent and simultaneous needs to invest in a clean energy transition and protect irreplicable farm and forest land, how can land trusts engage with local communities, individual landowners and solar developers to create conservation opportunities and improve outcomes? Panelists will describe how agrivoltaics work, how and where they are allowed under current regulatory frameworks and what can be done to improve results for farm and forest land conservation. Panelists will also discuss how land trusts have traditionally protected lands and how that role could change with new renewable energy initiatives.

Instructors:

• Robert Davies, executive director, Saratoga PLAN (NY) 

• Audrey Friedrichsen, senior climate and renewable energy attorney, Scenic Hudson (NY)  

• Linda Garrett, New York regional director 

• Jennifer Manierre, program manager, The Clean Energy Siting Team, New York State Energy and Research Development Authority (NY) 

• Jesse Robertson-DuBois, director of sustainable solar development,BlueWave (NY) 

Land conservation and affordable housing are sometimes pitted against one another, but healthy communities need both. Hardly a day goes by without an op-ed in the major press about the affordable housing crisis, exclusionary zoning and NIMBY’ISM, or the drastic loss of biodiversity and the climate crisis. While some see these topics as being in conflict, the convergence of the two can present an opportunity for land trusts – bearing on our DEIJ work and community-centered conservation. The conveners of the Hudson Valley Affordable Housing & Conservation Strategy, along with two of the ten land trust and affordable housing participants, will engage attendees about their work to advance common values, build relationships and trust, share information and identify projects they can undertake together. The groups have created a shared purpose statement and are mapping locations suitable for collaboration and developing policy recommendations to demonstrate mutual support for and de-silo their sectors.

Instructors:

• Steve Rosenberg, co-convener, Hudson Valley Affordable Housing & Conservation Strategy (NY)

• Al Bellenchia, executive director and CEO, Columbia County Habitat for Humanity (NY) 

• Rebecca Gillman Crimmins, co-convener, Hudson Valley Affordable Housing & Conservation Strategy (NY)  

• Seth McKee, executive director, Scenic Hudson, Inc. (NY)

This session features a mock trial and a brief settlement negotiation over a technical violation of a conservation easement. It will look at the importance of a land trust following the specified conservation easement procedures for review and approval of landowner permitted activities, the significance of documenting baseline conditions and the impact of a land trust’s acts or omissions on litigation outcomes.

Instructors:

• Jeff LeJava, Vice President & Associate General Counsel, Open Space Institute (CT)  

• Jake Tibbles, executive director, Thousand Islands Land Trust (NY)

• Phillip Oswald, partner, Rupp Pfalzgraf LLC (NY) 

• Elissa Goonan, conservation communities manager, Open Space Institute (NY) 

• Brendan Murphy, stewardship manager, Open Space Institute (NY) 

With more than 1,400 land trusts in the country, not to mention all the other non-profits out there, it’s not hard to find someone doing something new. But as nearly everyone who tried the ice-bucket challenge knows, not every idea will work equally well everywhere. How can we identify ideas with promise for us? Where we live and work? Join long-time fundraiser David Allen as he presents three innovative approaches to major gift fundraising that can and should be applicable for land trusts of just about any size, anywhere – Legacy Match Campaigns, Tradelands and Call Gifts. In all three cases, we will describe the basic idea, explore an actual case study and further imagine more localized applications. This is a major gifts workshop appropriate for fund development staff and board volunteers at all levels of fundraising experience.

Instructors:

• David Allen, principal consultant, Development for Conservation (WI)  

On February 22, The Land Conservancy of New Jersey preserved and returned land to the indigenous people of the Ramapo Mountains. Culminating a multi-year effort involving parties in both New Jersey and New York, this project integrated the expertise of funders, donors, scholars and land trusts to restore land to the original people to whom it belonged. The Land Conservancy, working with the Indigenous nation, government leaders and a diverse array of nonprofit partners, purchased the Ramapough Munsee Lenape Nation’s most sacred site, helped the tribe establish a land trust, and donated the land to the tribe to be held by them in perpetuity. For The Conservancy and their partners it was an act of restorative justice, of equity and of empowerment of marginalized communities.

Speaker:

• David Epstein, president, The Land Conservancy of New Jersey (NJ)

Climate change and landscape fragmentation are threatening biodiversity and leaving flora and fauna isolated on small islands of habitat. Without the ability to migrate, forage, or breed, species are unable to survive in a changing climate. Wildways and landscape-scale conservation efforts provide a framework for action to address this problem. The Eastern Wildway map spans eastern North America- from Florida to Canada and is an ambitious ecological plan connecting core areas and habitat corridors.  The Western New York Land Conservancy applied the Eastern Wildway concept regionally to create the Western New York Wildway. This presentation provides an explanation of the Eastern Wildway (with a focus on how it applies to New York State) and details how a regional land trust worked to localize the Wildlands Network landscape-scale conservation work. It will discuss the creation of the Western New York Wildway, including GIS techniques, outreach, prioritization and collaboration efforts.

Instructors:

• Marisa Riggi, deputy executive director of conservation, Western New York Land Conservancy (NY) 

• Ed Marx, Northeast project manager, Wildlands Network (NY) 

• Lisa Wiza, GIS specialist and planning contractor, Prospect Hill Consulting (NY) 

Do you have nightmares about public meetings? Do you wish you could hold your own, but wonder where to start? Join the Columbia Land Conservancy and the Henry L. Ferguson Museum for a participatory session about strategies for engaging the public, planning impactful participatory sessions and what to do when things do not go as planned! Review strategic questions to ask before embarking on a public participation process, learn from the experience of two different case studies and practice giving and receiving feedback in a supportive space.

Instructors:

• Rebecca Walker , director of marketing & communications, Columbia Land Conservancy (NY) 

• Heidi Bock, director of land stewardship & community partnerships, Columbia Land Conservancy (NY) 

• Elizabeth McCance, president, Henry L. Ferguson Museum and Fishers Island Land Trust (NY) 

Between baseline documentation reports, management plans, annual monitoring and other projects, Land trusts collect a lot of data. GPS points, photos, notes, reports and more are needed for effective management of fee and conservation easement properties. With so many GPS/field data collection applications that have varying features, limitations and learning curves, how do you find applications that meet your organization’s field data collection needs, work well together and limit the time it takes to process and compile the data back at the office? In this session we will present on the field data collection applications used by our organizations of various sizes, how these applications are utilized at our organizations and how they may be applicable and helpful for you.

Instructors:

• Ed Pestone, land protection and GIS manager, Mohonk Preserve (NY)

• Steven DiFalco, GIS and land data manager, Scenic Hudson (NY) 

• Chis Young, easement stewardship and GIS manager, Columbia Land Conservancy (NY)  

• Christina Croll, GIS manager, NYS Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (NY) 

In this session you will be given specific tools to help your Board want to fundraise and connect you with important partnerships. We will also present real life examples of successful community engagement through various types of programming and how to attract and retain the next generation of conservationists. Each topic will be presented in three, twenty-five-minute breakout sessions with a chance for each attendee to participate in each small group topic.

Instructors:

• Susan Leighton, donor relations and event manager, Westchester Land Trust (NY) 

• Michelle Culbert, associate director, Saratoga PLAN (NY) 

• Giulia Casella, fundraising and events manager, Lake George Land Conservancy (NY)