What Does a Land Trust Do?

Do you know?

Do you think the Nevada County Land Trust buys land?

They have conservation easements of 4,900 acres of land in Nevada County. What does that mean? That the owners of the private land with conservation easements don't allow the public on their land. It just means it won't be developed but the family gets a tax break and it stays in the family.

So, in 19 years, our Land Trust has actually bought 100 acres. Do you know where it is? Have you read about how you can access it?

Didn't think so.

Remember when Al Salter gave the Land Trust some acreage off Bitney Springs for a dog park? And the Land Trust sold it for $600,000??

Guess what? They still have the money.

They have given some animal groups a portion of the interest, but the $600,000 is mostly still there.

They're waiting for the "right" proposal to come along, I guess.

So when you spend $80 for a concert ticket. where does that money go?

I'm just asking....

Comments

[Dixie Redfearn]

Steve,
I understand that land trusts in surrounding counties have acquired vast land for public use. I can research that for you if you want. BTW, on another topic, Walgreens is back to building. Do you know what happened?

[Steve Enos]

The majority of land trust projects, not just the Nevada County Land Trust, are conservation easement projects. Paying land owners, mostly farmers and ranchers to not develop their land with more housing tracks.

This lowers the carry costs to the farmers/ranchers and makes the operation economical. It also provides tax opportunities so the family can take over the ranches/farmers and not loose them or need to sell them when Dad dies. They can pass the ranch/farm on and keep it in the family.

The idea you have about land trusts buying land is wrong, that is not what the vast majority of the land trust projects do.

If you want to get informed visit the Nature Conservancy and Trust for Public Land websites and see what land trusts do... they conserve land and habitat in a number of ways.

Also if you want to get some real understand look into the Tahoe/Truckee/Donner land trust in Truckee, visit their website.

Often land trusts help land owners sell and the state and feds purchase land. Land trusts raise money to do this and they help pay for the purchase. Then the land gets turned over to the state or feds for public use. You might want to research the history of the S. Fork of the Yuba River and how much of that now public land was aquired.

Please take the time to get informed about land trusts, what they do and how they do it.

[George Rebane]

And I also was more than surprised when today (at the NC Rotary lunch) it sunk in that from all those acres only a small fraction will ever be open for public access. The current owners of the Land Trust's land, and their successors never have to open it up for any other purpose than what it's used for today. Maybe they should put that in bigger print on their promo materials the next time they're having a fund raiser.

Hope someone answers Dixie's question about where the contributions wind up.