Posted
by Tom King
April 4, 2006 at 3:12 p.m.
The Kansas Land Trust
The tallgrass prairie once covered 140 million acres, right up the middle of our country, from southern Texas to Southern Manitoba in Canada. Only two percent of America's tallgrass prairie remains today, most of it in Kansas. A mere three and a half million acres remain as grazing lands in the Flint Hills, and the Kansas Land Trust has its eye on that precious patch of prairie. What the [Kansas Land Trust][1] (KLT) does, most of the time, is encourage donations of conservation easements from willing landowners. A conservation easement is an agreement between a land trust and a landowner that a designated area of land will never be developed for hard-impact commercial, industrial and residential purposes. The conservation contract is irrevocable, even if the ownership of the land changes. The landowner still owns the land and maintains the right to use it, primarily for agricultural or ranching purposes. The KLT tailors each contract to the needs and finances of the landowner, advises on and monitors sound management and conservation practices, and legally enforces the landowner's protection strategy, forever. Most of the conservation easements administered by the KLT are on behalf of landowners wanting to protect the valuable and unique qualities of their land--donations (usually more than 20 acres), make up about 90% of KLT's contracts. Increasingly, to protect areas of particular quality, the KLT will purchase the land outright.The first land trust in the United States was founded on the East Coast before 1900; today, more than 1,200 land trusts are at work across the country. All land trusts begin as non-profit, grassroots organizations; several, such as the Nature Conservancy and the Sierra Club, have grown to national prominence and wield considerable political clout.The Kansas Land Trust was founded in the late 1980's by Steve Hamburg and Kelly Kindscher, prompted by "the manner of growth and development on the outskirts of Lawrence and the loss of the Elkins Prairie," says Kindscher. [Hamburg][2] is now the Director of the Environmental Studies Program at Brown University; [Kindscher][3], currently president of the KLT, is an Associate Scientist with the Kansas Biological survey, serves on the Executive Committee of the University of Kansas, and is the author of two books on prairie ethnobotany. The loss of the [Elkins Prairie][4] galvanized Hamburg and Kindscher, caused much local furor and made the national news (New York Times; Newsweek). In November of 1990, eighty acres of virgin prairie on the outskirts of town--land of great conservation value and home to two endangered species--were plowed under by the landowner in the middle of the night on a weekend, in the midst of conservation negotiations with the County. Kindscher calls the landowner's action "malicious".Nearly 30 years later, the KLT is going strong. In 2005, the KLT purchased conservation easements of 200 acres of prairie north of Manhattan, and a 500-acre working cattle ranch near Council Grove. In January 2006, the KLT entered into partnership with Fort Riley to offer conservation easement purchases to landowners of the 50,000 acres surrounding the base. Environmentalists are usually at odds with the military, but the KLT overlooked political pettiness and focused on the wealth of life and habitat contained within the 50,000 acre buffer tract: 45% native tallgrass prairie and 55% prime agricultural land. The area supports at least 43 species of mammals--including the largest free-ranging elk herd in Kansas; 40 species of reptiles and amphibians; 50 species of fish; and 223 species of birds (recognized as a "Globally Important Bird Area" by the American Bird Conservancy). The Fort Riley buffer is home to four federally-listed and eight Kansas-listed threatened or endangered species, and 23 other species considered by Kansas to be Species of Greatest Conservation Need. To date, 233 species of plants have been collected and preserved from the Fort Riley buffer zone.The KLT has no fear of taking the mission of conservation across party lines and consorting with "the competition" to get the job done. "We want to see the land preserved," says Kindscher; "it doesn't really matter who does it". The KLT recently helped the Kansas Livestock Association start its own land trust, and has handed off a project or two to other land trusts, notably the Nature Conservancy, when it seemed that the end justified the means. For the past four years, RoxAnne Miller has been the Executive Director of the KLT. At the annual meeting last February--featuring supper at the Lecompton Methodist Church (I counted nine kinds of pie), and an astounding presentation by photographer [Terry Evans][5] (who spent many years shooting America from the air, specifically images of human influence upon the land)--Miller outlined plans for the future. Much of her talk had to do with the Flint Hills. Not only does the KLT obviously seek to preserve the prairie and grazing lands of the Flint Hills, Miller also emphasized the preservation of Kansas' farming and ranching heritage. The American family farm is yet another seriously endangered species. Of Interest: [Tallgrass Legacy Alliance][6] [Land Trust Alliance][7] [American Bird Conservancy][8] [1]: http://www.klt.org/ [2]: http://envstudies.brown.edu/dept/people/faculty/shamburg/index.html/ [3]: http://www.kbs.ku.edu/people/staff_www/kindscher/facweb_kindscher.htm/ [4]: OWNER TAKES PLOW TO PRAIRIE [5]: http://www.terryevansphotography.com/ [6]: http://www.oznet.ksu.edu/tla/ [7]: http://www.lta.org [8]: http://www.abcbirds.org/
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ladylaw (Terry Bush) says…
Interesting..I don't know much about the topic, but I know that there are a lot of people in Kansas who are upset about too much "city sprawl" into the more rural areas.
According to http://www.possibility.com/LandTrust/ "...land trusts in the US have been increasing at 23% a year or one per week.
More than half of the nearly 2,000 land trusts in the United States have been formed within the past 15 years. In 1950 there were 53 trusts in 26 states; 132 by 1965. During the next decade the number doubled, passing the 300 mark by 1995. By 1980 the number was 429. By the end of 1990 the number of land trusts soared to 889 with a combined membership of over 750,000.
Today land trusts operate in all 50 states, the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. The greatest growth in recent years has been on the west coast, the northeast, and the mid-Atlantic region. California has the highest number of trusts in the west, 76. Massachusetts with 116 has the highest number in the northeast, followed by Connecticut with 114 and New York with 59. Pennsylvania leads the mid-Atlantic with 38 followed by Maryland with 34 land trusts."
One thing I want to know is this: How does a land trust stand up against governmental eminent domain powers....or can/does one? In other words, even if all the private owners in question agree to keep specific land held back from being developed, what happens if a county, state, city or the US Government decides it wants/needs the land to build something on it? Can a land trust survive such an attempt, without first making the Government itself part of the trust document/agreement?
kindscher (anonymous) says…
Good question about condemnation of easements. There is a pecking order of condemnation (for a public purpose which has been viewed very broadly by the courts) from feds to tribes to state to local government to non-profits, so an easement held by any of the above can be condemned by those above it. Its not quite that simple as the easements that KLT is purchasing involve federal monies so that would elevate them, and any land protected by an easement would have some public support and so condemning it might not be a good political move. And a couple other things, easements are not likely to be used successfully to block a road or other development as they would be viewed as a political move rather than a conservation move (and would more likely be condemned). And related to roads and condemnation, an important reason why the Trafficway was not built across Haskell Indian Nations University was because Haskell is a Bureau of Indian Affairs and is therefore serving a federal public purpose of education and cannot be condemned by KDOT or the Federal Highway Administration.
Kelly Kindscher
Valentine (anonymous) says…
In regards to your pie comment...
I live right outside of Lawrence and attended school in Lecompton and Perry, so some of my friends' families certainly went to Lecompton Methodist. One evening I had dinner at the church with a friend of mine, and though I have no recollection of what particular occasion was being celebrated, I do remember that I ate a slice of pumpkin pie that to this day remains the best piece of any kind of pie I've ever had. Mmm them small towns gots some good cookin'
Now for something relevant to your post. This is the first time I've ever heard of land trusts. (I'm only 18, so is that forgivable?) Let me be the millonth person to declare that they are grand idea indeed. It's wonderful when people can put all the bullshit politics aside and get something done that most people don't even realize needs to be done. (Applause)
cvillehawk (anonymous) says…
We have an interesting organization here in Charlottesville, VA that I have been researching for a class. They are a non-profit catch-all organization for the entire district including several counties. http://www.tjpdc.org/
They help local towns come up with development initiatives and find government money to fund them, and they keep scientists on staff to assess environmental impact, etc. Central Virginia is growing at an alarming rate, and I am very interested in what the TJPDC is doing - they acknowledge that growth is inevitable but seem to be trying to nudge new development away from the sprawl model and toward environmental and historical sensitivity.
Celeste (anonymous) says…
I remember when the Elkins Prairie was destroyed-it made me cry when I heard about it. I think Land Trusts are a great idea. I am living in Chandler, Az right now, and the speed of development is staggering. Where it used to be only farmland 10, 5, even 2 years ago, is disappering at an alarming rate. We're swallowing up land with no end in sight. Pretty soon "rural" will be but a memory.
I plan on moving back to Kansas as soon as humanly possible. Besides, compared to Az, it's dirt cheap to live, and the air is a *lot* cleaner.
karmaxs3 (anonymous) says…
Hey Celeste,
We just moved to Gilbert from Lawrence, and I can assure you, it is NOT dirt cheap to live there compared to Chandler. Property values are just as ridiculously inflated, and the development is only slightly less destructive. Property tax is actually higher in Lawrence, and you'll be paying sales tax on your food. However, the air is much cleaner, but for me, that doesn't make up for Nov-Feb...or the humidity June-Aug. One other bonus is that there aren't high tension electric lines everywhere in Kansas. Yet.
Anyhoo, the reason I was writing, is that there was an article in the Arizona Repulic last weekend about the Arizona Land Trust. They own about 9 million acres in the state, several of which are directly east of Phoenix. They are currently trying to figure out a way to plan for development and their desire is to have an environmentally sound, irrevocable plan in place....that's right...before they sell it to developers. They have sold over $500 million in property to developers in recent years. Like Celeste said, the development here is like wildfire. The plus side is that all proceeds go to education. (At least they haven't voted to not teach evolution here yet)
So, not all land trusts are interested in preserving land from developers. Just FYI.
ladylaw (Terry Bush) says…
New logo???