Bipartisan House Bill Seeks to Make Forest Legacy More Nimble
A bipartisan House bill introduced this week would promote conservation of private forestlands by reducing administrative burdens for states and easing concerns from landowners and philanthropists.
The bill from Rep. Chris Gibson (R-N.Y.) would allow conservation easements under the Forest Legacy program to be held by accredited land trusts, relieving states of having to steward and monitor those conservation commitments.
Currently, only government entities — primarily states and the federal government — are allowed to hold conservation easements under the program.
Gibson said his bill would bring Forest Legacy in line with similar conservation programs, such as the Natural Resources Conservation Service’s Agricultural Lands Easement Program and the North American Wetlands Conservation Act.
“This is a competitive program and demand outpaces funding,” he said in a statement. “This reform will allow states, if they choose, to leverage private funding sources to safeguard our rural landscapes.”
Other co-sponsors of the bill are Reps. John Garamendi (D-Calif.), Jim Costa (D-Calif.), Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), Ann McLane Kuster (D-N.H.), David Loebsack (D-Iowa), Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-Calif.), Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.), Mike Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.).
Gibson and Garamendi introduced a similar bill last May, but it did not receive a hearing before the House Agriculture Committee (Greenwire, May 8, 2014).
Forest Legacy is among the least controversial programs in the Land and Water Conservation Fund because it conserves private lands rather than purchasing lands and enlarging the federal estate. Congress funded Forest Legacy at $53 million in fiscal 2015, out of a total LWCF budget of just over $300 million. The Forest Service is requesting $61 million in discretionary funding for Forest Legacy in fiscal 2016, with an additional $39 million in mandatory funding.
Conservation easements represent commitments by forest owners not to develop their lands into subdivisions or other uses that would harm wildlife or diminish recreation opportunities. Over the past two decades, an average of more than 1 million acres of forestland have been lost to conversion annually, according to a media release from the Pacific Forest Trust, a major backer of the bill.
Laurie Wayburn, the trust’s president, said the Gibson bill would encourage more participation in Forest Legacy by landowners and the philanthropic community by reducing the involvement of government. ”Philanthropies often prefer to give to nonprofits rather than undertake what they see as a government obligation,” Wayburn said. “And many private landowners prefer to work with qualified, nonprofit land trusts rather than governmental entities. Enabling Forest Legacy to also leverage this kind of private partnership will make this program even better.”
The Pacific Forest Trust said two Forest Legacy projects in Florida and California were recently derailed because landowners strongly objected to government agencies serving as easement grantees.
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Read this article in Greenwire.