SANTA FE CONSERVATION TRUST

SFCT will preserve the natural and cultural landscapes that make the greater Santa Fe community a distinctly special place.

1) Conservation Planning: Define the bigger picture by setting conservation priorities and creating analysis maps with the assistance of GIS (geographical information system) program. Use this analysis along with research and partnerships with related organizations in order to proactively seek easements and conservation projects. The conservation map/plan defines our conservation vision for the Santa Fe area-guides SFCT conservation priorities and advocacy, and engages the community in conservation

2) Stewardship and Monitoring: 100% of SFCT easements are to be monitored every year. Existing conservation easements to be compliant and documented with all applicable laws and standards, in order to make the strongest and legally defensible easements.

3) LTA Accreditation: Achieve accreditation with the Land Trust Alliance, the over-arching national organization of land trusts. Accreditation will be accomplished in 2013 (we are currently in the process of accreditation).

4) Trail Advocacy: Promote the use of trails through outreach and education. Investigate the need for trails and public access in new and existing areas, in order to create a comprehensive trail network in the greater Santa Fe area. Be identified by trail users as THE local trail advocate.

5) Funding and Capacity: Understand and manage our capacity, strive to have the optimal employees for fulfilling our mission programs, administrative and developmental needs. Build an adequate, diverse and stable funding base in order to support the capacity (human, technological, financial) to achieve goals.

1) Conservation Planning: By utilizing ArcGIS software, we will construct a parcel map of each of our focal areas. With a set of conservation values, each parcel will be given a priority, depending on how many conservation values it contains. The parcels that contain the largest number of conservation values are given the highest priority, which can be used to indicate possible conservation projects and easements. Other considerations, such as high development/highly threatened areas, relationships with landowners, and other political or environmental issues will also be brought to the table and taken into account.
2) Stewardship and Monitoring: The monitoring effort is spear-headed by the conservation & stewardship coordinator, who also performs updates to baseline documentation for each easement. Other staff, board, and volunteers may perform the regular monitoring visits, by vehicle, on foot, or aerially, taking particular note of features and values of each easement as delineated in the baseline report, and reporting/documenting any concerns that may arise. Monitoring activities will take place every year for every easement.
3) LTA Accreditation: Having already passed through the pre-application process, our current goal is the main accreditation process itself. All staff and available board members are assisting in the gathering of policies, project documentation and other materials required by the Land Trust Accreditation Commission. Also, in order to assist in the process, we have hired a consultant who has taken another land trust through the entire process successfully, in order to oversee and guide our efforts.
4) Trail Advocacy: Trail advocacy is a multifaceted issue, and thus the strategy for accomplishing is also multifaceted. Outreach and development events are conducted on a regular basis, including on National Trails Day, the local showing of the Banff Film Festival, and in guided hikes and tours, which normally occur in the Galisteo Basin, one of our focal areas. On the trail development side, we participate in local planning and implementation of new and existing trails, including the actual management of construction and implementation of new trails. Maintenance and support of existing trails is conducted by our all-volunteer trail arm, the Trails Alliance of Santa Fe.
5) Funding and Capacity: by cultivating an operating reserve, endowment accounts and funds for the support and defense of our easements, while maintaining a balanced yearly budget, SFCT intends to remain a very stable organization that will stand the test of time, especially under the consideration that our easements are permanent documents that must be upheld in perpetuity. Staff will be maintained that is capable of fulfilling our legal and fiduciary duties on a yearly basis, while allowing for growth and development of the organization and our portfolio of easements and properties.

SFCT currently has $600,000 annual operating budget, reviewed and approved by its board of directors and maintains an operating reserve that could sustain the organization for at least a year, given no other income. We hold 89 conservation easements, representing approximately $60,000,000 of property value and development rights. SFCT has a commendable history of collecting stewardship funds for its conservation easements and has both an endowment and a dedicated fund established for stewardship and legal defense. The land trust currently has sufficient funds as set forth by the Land Trust Accreditation Commission.

The land trust currently has 6 full time staff members and has over 200 volunteers assisting it with its work. Our professional staff includes an Executive Director, Land Program Manager, Trails Program Manager, Operations Manager, Events, Volunteer & Development Coordinator and an Executive Assistant. SFCT's personnel capacity has changed little since 1993 yet the land trust has added significantly to its conservation easement portfolio, trail development efforts and other community work. Furthermore, SFCT's conservation easement stewardship obligations are growing. Approximately 1/3 of SFCT's 89 easement-protected properties are owned by successor generation landowners and studies have consistently shown these are the landowners most likely to violate their conservation easements. Easement stewardship consists of far more than simply annual easement monitoring – it also includes building landowner relations, answering landowner questions, recordkeeping, addressing easement amendments and resolving easement violations.

SFCT maintains a broad network of connections that assist in the accomplishment of its goals: a donor base that has been cultivated over the last 25 years; related and synergistic non-profits and government conservation programs; and landowners in and around our focal areas.

In 2018, we added six conservation easements to our portfolio, monitored 100% of our existing properties, finished construction on a new trail connection, hosted our 2000th child on the trails through our Passport to Trails Program, and launch our Vamonos: Santa Fe Walks program, modelled off of the national "Walk with a Doc" initiative. We hope to continue these trends in the current year and beyond. Every year we have the goal of achieving 100% monitoring of our existing easements. Though new easements are actively sought out every year, we must also reign ourselves in so that we do not exceed our capacity to monitor these new easements in the future. Trails will be built when interest and opportunity (and funding!) converge. So we will continue in making these small steps towards our vision of conservation, while fulfilling our annual obligations balanced with our abilities and capacity.

More significant connected areas of conserved land will also protect and expand migration corridors, create buffer zones in areas of high development, tie water rights to the land, offer more opportunities to expand and create trails for public access, and expand/connect SFCT’s patchwork of existing protected areas, providing greater conservation benefits to the public.

The proposed Strategic Conservation Plan is ambitious, because landscape-sized areas of conserved land means SFCT will need to expand its business model to include buying all or some of a landowner’s development rights, helping landowners cover the cost of CEs, and, if need be, purchasing lands of high conservation value. In order to provide for equity, diversity and inclusion in our conservation work, we will have to raise considerable funds to work with a wider diversity of landowners. SFCT’s Strategic Conservation Plan will help landowners across the economic spectrum to protect and retain their lands in high priority conservation areas. There are two final steps we need to finish before we can move forward: first, in early 2020, we will present the plan to our stakeholders and the public, so we can better craft this plan to fit the needs of the community and the region. After the public comment phase, we will leverage the plan to generate significant income to allow SFCT to work with a broader variety of landowners to create larger conservation areas.