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CTNC AmeriCorps Members Gather Hundreds for MLK Day of Service

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Each year, CTNC AmeriCorps members join a nationwide movement to honor the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. by participating in the annual Day of Service. In partnership with six host organizations in western North Carolina, the Triangle and coastal region, CTNC’s AmeriCorps members organized events that drew hundreds of volunteers to spend time outside and contribute to conservation projects in their local community.

Scroll down to see photos from each of the events where staff, AmeriCorps members and volunteers cleaned up a public nature preserve, collected oyster shells for a living reef installation, reforested open fields to revitalize habitat for wildlife and much more.

Anne Maxwell Ellett
Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association

Eighty people attended a clean-up event organized by Anne Maxwell to support stewardship of Ellerbe Creek Watershed Association’s Beaver Creek Marsh Preserve. The group worked on clearing invasive species (ivy and privet), collected multiple truck-loads of trash, and mended fences. More CTNC AmeriCorps members joined Anne Maxwell for the event including Emily Goetz, Bald Head Island Conservancy; Ashley Meredith, Durham Hub Farm; Joy-Lynn Rhoton, Highlands-Cashiers Land Trust; Kate Conery, NC Coastal Foundation; Reilly Kelly, NC Coastal Foundation; Lauren Huffstetler, Piedmont Triad Regional Council; Kayla Kohlmann, Piedmont Triad Regional Council; Molly Richard, Triangle Land Conservancy; Jade Woll, NC Coastal Land Trust.

Click here to see photos!

Kristin Gibson
North Carolina Coastal Federation

In partnership with Leadership Carteret, AmeriCorps member Kristin Gibson organized an event for 12 students to bag oyster shells. The effort totaled 200 bags that will help construct a living oyster reef. Volunteers were so dedicated, they stayed longer than necessary to get all the work done!

April Hausle
North Carolina Arboretum

AmeriCorps member April Hausle participated in a workday at Shiloh Community Garden in Asheville. Residents of the historically black community added mulch to the garden and completed a social justice art project where children cut out magazine photos to design a mural of the United States. Michelle Durr, who is serving at Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, also attended.

Jannette Morris
Eno River Association

An old farm field along the Eno River will be restored to its natural habitat after 100 volunteers gathered to plan 200 hardwood trees. Jannette Morris organized the tree-planting, which will contribute to cleaner water flowing from the Eno River into Falls Lake, the main drinking water source for Raleigh and eight other reservoirs.

Click here to see photos!

Bethany Sheffer
Balsam Mountain Trust

Representing CTNC AmeriCorps, Bethany Sheffer volunteered with Conserving Carolina’s Project Conserve members at Asheville’s Burton Street Community Peace Gardens. The event was led by DeWayne Barton, founder of Hood Huggers International, which offers sustainable strategies for building support pillars for resilient historically African American neighborhoods, providing a framework for community capacity building while increasing the effectiveness of existing service programs. The Burton Street Peace Gardens is a sanctuary for positive action, designed to create neighborhood food security, community cohesion and a vibrant, sustainable local economy.

Click here to see photos!

Jonathan Hill, Keep Durham Beautiful

In partnership with Duke Roundtable, a Duke University student service group, Jonathan Hill organized a litter clean-up recruiting 100 volunteers to participate in the Keep Durham Beautiful event.

Click here to see photos!

Dawn Keyser
Keep Durham Beautiful

AmeriCorps member Dawn Keyser organized two tree plantings that put 120 trees in the ground. Many of the 70 participants were students of the School of Science and Math and Emily K. Center volunteers.

Click here to see photos!

CTNC AmeriCorps is a 10-month national service program in environmental education and outreach. This program, along with CTNC’s N.C. Youth Conservation Corps and the Diversity in Conservation Internship Program are part of CTNC’s Emerging Leaders Program, which seeks to reconnect people with the outdoors and to develop future leaders in conservation. AmeriCorps members develop service projects that help remove barriers to environmental education throughout North Carolina, as well as help expand the diversity of backgrounds among conservation leaders in our state.

1,000-Acre Conservation Project Promises Clean Water and Pristine Parkway Views

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Wildacres Retreat, a 1,076-acre property adjacent to Pisgah National Forest and the Blue Ridge Parkway, is now permanently protected thanks to a collaborative partnership among Foothills Conservancy of North Carolina, Conservation Trust for North Carolina (CTNC), and Wildacres Retreat.

Wildacres Retreat, located in northern McDowell County near Little Switzerland, is a nonprofit conference center governed by a board of directors. The center offers its facilities and surrounding woodlands to nonprofit groups for educational and cultural programming, and for board and staff retreats.

The property is protected under two conservation easements. A state-held Clean Water Management Trust Fund easement will protect stream buffers and critical natural heritage areas, while a second easement held by Conservation Trust for North Carolina will preserve a key portion of forested lands connected to the Blue Ridge Parkway and Pisgah National Forest. Together, the easements will safeguard wildlife habitat and protect water quality in five miles of streams of the Armstrong Creek watershed in the headwaters of the Catawba River.  Foothills Conservancy will monitor and steward these conservation easements on a contractual basis.

“Protection of these lands fills in a very important piece of the puzzle to permanently conserve extensive forests and habitats in the very high-quality Armstrong Creek watershed of the Catawba,” said Tom Kenney, Land Protection Director for Foothills Conservancy. “Wildacres adjoins a Wildlife Resources Commission fish hatchery and more than 10,000 acres of federal Pisgah National Forest Service lands. All this conservation helps ensure Lake James has a very clean water supply protection source.”

There are nearly six miles of hiking trails on the property for public use, including one trail into the property from Deer Lick Gap Overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

The project was primarily funded by a $1 million grant from North Carolina Clean Water Management Trust Fund awarded to Foothills Conservancy and a $26,000 donation from Philip Blumenthal, director of Wildacres Retreat. In addition, CTNC secured a Duke Water Resources grant, $50,000 grant from the Cannon Foundation, a $100,000 grant from the North Carolina Attorney General’s Office Environmental Enhancement Grant Program, and $177,240 from the Open Space Institute’s Resilient Landscapes Initiative, which is made possible with funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. The Resilient Landscapes Initiative seeks to build the capacity of land trusts working to respond to climate change. A grant of $34,779 from the Duke Energy Water Resources Fund, administered by the NC Community Foundation enabled CTNC to pay off a loan secured to purchase the easements.

Clean Water Management Trust Fund Executive Director Walter Clark described the organization’s reasons for contributing to the project to conserve what he calls an “incredible piece of property.”

“The Clean Water Management Trust Fund supported the Wildacres project for multiple reasons, including its protection of five miles of high-quality trout waters, which contain headwater streams in the Catawba River Basin,” said Clark. “The project also protects multiple forest communities important to North Carolina’s natural heritage.” Since its establishment in 1996, Clean Water Management Trust Fund has protected over 500,000 acres, including 2,500 miles of streams.

“The Wildacres Retreat property has been among CTNC and Foothills Conservancy’s highest priority projects for years,” said Rusty Painter, CTNC Land Protection Director. “Conserving its ecologically diverse habitat between the Blue Ridge Parkway and Pisgah National Forest achieves the type of landscape-scale conservation that’s one goal of our Blue Ridge Parkway conservation plan. Successes like this would not be possible without the commitment of champions like Philip Blumenthal and the Wildacres Retreat Board of Directors.”

Blumenthal added, “It’s been a long-term goal of the Blumenthal family to ensure the ecological integrity of this unique property for the benefit of Wildacres Retreat visitors and all who enjoy the Blue Ridge Parkway. We’re fortunate to have land trusts like CTNC and Foothills Conservancy who work tirelessly to save places we all love in North Carolina. They ensure our state’s most valuable assets will be protected forever.”

“Permanent conservation of the Wildacres property marks a major milestone for the protection of habitat in North Carolina,” said Peter Howell, OSI’s Executive Vice President of Conservation Capital & Research Programs. “As the climate changes, this highly resilient property will provide a long-term haven for sensitive plants and animals. The Open Space Institute is proud to have supported this project and we applaud Conservation Trust for North Carolina and the Foothills Conservancy of North Carolina for their collaboration and tireless work to seize this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Federally-protected land in this region is fragmented and thousands of acres are still vulnerable to development. Western North Carolina land trusts frequently partner to preserve National Forest and Blue Ridge Parkway lands for the benefit of all North Carolinians.

For more information, contact:

Tom Kenney, Land Protection Director, Ph: 828-437-9930, tkenney@foothillsconservancy.org

Mary Alice Holley, CTNC Communications Director, Ph: 919-864-0428, mholley@ctnc.org

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CTNC AmeriCorps Year 2 – The Numbers Are In!

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AmeriCorps and national service programs unite people of all backgrounds, offering a transformative opportunity, and bringing unprecedented skills and willpower to solve local problems. AmeriCorps is essential to North Carolina’s positive quality of life.

CTNC AmeriCorps recently completed year 2 (2015-2016) of our AmeriCorps program, which seeks to reconnect people with the outdoors and to develop future leaders in conservation.

See what our 21 members achieved in the past 10 months!

  • Served 30,898 children and adults in environmental education
  • Recruited and managed 3,472 volunteers totaling 8,167 volunteer hours
  • Volunteer hours equated to a $192,408 donation of services to North Carolina communities

These members exceeded expectation – greatly expanding the number of individuals who showed an increase in knowledge of environmental issues. And AmeriCorps host sites achieved greater organizational capacity on volunteer management best practices because AmeriCorps members utilized volunteers in their programs.

Our members’ work spanned rural and urban communities reaching residents in 38 counties from Sylva to Durham to Manteo. Focused on environmental education and outreach, our AmeriCorps members develop service projects that help remove barriers to environmental education throughout North Carolina, as well as help expand the diversity of backgrounds among conservation leaders in the state.

AmeriCorps works!

In 2017, CTNC launched year 3 of the AmeriCorps service program. Meet our 2017 AmeriCorps members!

Triangle Farms for Food Strategy + Action Plan Provides Road Map for Farmland Preservation and Local Food Economy

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Click Here to Download the Triangle Farms For Food: Strategy + Action Plan.

The market for fresh local food continues to grow in the Triangle region, but development pressures on existing farms and the lack of access to farmland for new farmers are major barriers to increasing local food production. There is a critical need to protect farmland to provide long-term food security for all Triangle residents.

The Conservation Trust and its partners have completed a regional farmland preservation and agricultural economic development strategy for the Triangle. With grant support from the Triangle Community Foundation and Sustainable Foods NC, CTNC has published, “Triangle Farms for Food: Strategy + Action Plan.”

Click here to download the full report and additional supporting materials.

Partners

In addition to the Triangle Community Foundation and Sustainable Foods NC, partners included Community Food Lab, Triangle Land Conservancy, Eno River Association, Center for Environmental Farming Systems and Carolina Farm Stewardship Association. The overall goals of the partners are to protect existing farmland and keep it in production, support existing and beginning farmers, advance agricultural awareness and build a strong local food economy in the region.

Strategy

The strategy covers Chatham, Durham, Johnston, Orange and Wake Counties. These five counties combined have lost more than 63,500 acres of farmland since 1997. The strategy uses Geographic Information System (GIS) analysis to prioritize farmland for protection in the five-county region. The criteria for prioritizing rural farmland included prime soils, agricultural land cover, farm size, proximity to protected farmland, development pressure and distance to markets.  The strategy also prioritizes smaller farms in proximity to urban areas and food deserts that can serve as the focal point for farmland preservation and urban agricultural development.

Impact

The report identifies 788 parcels consisting of more than 50,000 acres of farmland in rural areas and 65 parcels consisting of more than 850 acres in urban areas as high priority farmland. Based on the GIS data and feedback from stakeholders throughout the region, the project partners developed six place-based strategies and six regional strategies to promote farmland preservation and agricultural economic development across the Triangle.

The Conservation Trust will continue working with partners in the region to implement the strategy and three-year action plan to achieve our collective vision: active, productive, and economically-viable farms are common sights throughout the Triangle’s rural and urban landscapes, contributing to sustainable communities and a resilient regional food system.

This post was co-authored by Edgar Miller, Government Relations Director and Caitlin Burke, Special Projects and Grants Coordinator. To learn more about Triangle Farms for Food click here. 

Help Save the Orchard at Altapass

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Give generously today to help CTNC conserve this authentic Blue Ridge Parkway destination!

The Orchard at Altapass is a place where 50,000 people each year take in stunning mountain vistas, dance to local music, study monarch butterflies, hike trails, take hayrides, and eat fresh apples, fudge, and ice cream. And they hear poignant and hilarious stories about the families that lived in these hills generations ago. The storyteller? Orchard owner Bill Carson, the funniest former NASA rocket scientist you’ll ever come across.

The Conservation Trust for North Carolina is working closely with Bill and his sister Kit Trubey to conserve forever the Orchard’s land, apple trees, trails, vistas, and cultural heritage.

Bill and Kit are dedicated to protecting this iconic Parkway landmark. They bought the 276-acre property twenty years ago to prevent development of the views and worked with the Conservation Trust to conserve almost half the land in 2001. Now, they want to guarantee the preservation of the rest, for the days long after they’re gone.

Our plan is to purchase a lasting conservation agreement on the property that will protect the orchard’s vistas and enable all of the current activities to continue. But it’s not a simple path to get there. This is a complicated project because of all the orchard’s activities, our long-term stewardship responsibilities, and the need for substantial state funding.

We need your help to ensure that we can get the job done this year. We need to raise $30,000 by June 30th to cover our transaction costs and leverage public funds to complete the project.

If we fail, the orchard’s future could be bleak. A future where inappropriate residential or commercial development rules the day, and ruins this priceless destination. That would be nothing less than a tragedy.

We hope you will give generously today to help us conserve this national treasure. Your support will help us prevent any changes that would ruin the natural beauty, mountain culture, and local economy that the orchard supports. Let’s keep the Orchard at Altapass the truly amazing place that it is.  Thank you!

CTNC Releases Report Detailing Importance of NC Conservation Tax Credit

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The Conservation Trust for North Carolina released a report, “Sprint to the Finish: The Final Days of the North Carolina Conservation Tax Credit,” documenting the public benefits provided by the state income tax credit that made it economically feasible for private landowners to conserve their family land.  The report also details the Conservation Trust’s “Money in the Ground” initiative, which provided local land trusts with private funding to complete land conservation projects that utilized the tax credit before it expired at the end of last year.  Read the report HERE.

North Carolina was the first state to establish a conservation tax credit, recognizing the importance of encouraging private lands conservation to provide clean drinking water, fish and wildlife habitat, farmland for growing fresh local foods, and recreation opportunities for North Carolinians.  Since its inception in 1983, landowners have used the tax credit to voluntarily protect more than 250,000 acres of conservation land, while leveraging six dollars in land or conservation easement donations for every dollar of tax credit granted.

When the North Carolina General Assembly repealed the Conservation Tax Credit in 2013 as part of broad tax reform legislation, a popular incentive for landowners to conserve their land was eliminated.  Coupled with reduced funding for the state’s conservation trust funds over the last six years, this decision could significantly limit future voluntary conservation of private lands, slowing efforts to protect streams, farms, forests, and scenic vistas throughout North Carolina.

In response to the repeal of the NC Conservation Tax Credit, North Carolina’s 24 local land trusts intensified efforts in the final months of 2013, collaborating with landowners to conserve as many properties as possible before the tax credit expired on January 1, 2014.  Last year, local land trusts saw an 80% increase in donated land and conservation easements over the previous year, suggesting the tax credit was a powerful motivator for private land conservation.

Another indicator of the tax credit’s importance is the success of CTNC’s “Money in the Ground” initiative, a grant program that helped local land trusts complete tax credit-eligible projects with interested landowners. This grant program provided private funding for payment of transaction costs (appraisals, surveys, legal fees, etc.) to complete land or easement donations.  Often, neither the landowner nor the land trust has funds on hand to cover these costs.  The Conservation Trust granted $1.06 million from its own funds to 16 land trusts to conserve 63 properties totaling almost 7,400 acres of natural lands, leveraging more than $28 million.

“The tax credit worked because it enabled voluntary private land conservation and provided important public benefits like clean water, parks, and fresh local foods, all at a bargain to the state,” said Reid Wilson, Executive Director of the Conservation Trust for North Carolina.  “We urge the General Assembly to restore this successful and popular tax credit in the future

Clean Water – From Land to Your Glass

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Waynesville watershed is model for connecting natural land to drinking water quality

Lee Galloway knew what still needed to be done to protect his town’s drinking water supply.

Galloway, the Town Manager for Waynesville, a mountain town of about 10,000 people in Haywood County, had to figure out how to conserve the last big chunk of land that contains hundreds of creeks feeding the town’s reservoir. The 50-acre lake sits at the bottom of a bowl of towering, forested mountains. Galloway knew that every drop of rain that hit those mountainsides could reach the lake – his town’s drinking water supply.

Arial view of the Waynesville Watershed.

More than a century ago, Waynesville’s leaders began buying properties within this watershed to ensure safe drinking water for the town’s residents. Their forward-thinking actions set a precedent. Most of the land in the watershed was bought during the first half of the 20th century, but a large section still remained in private hands. The problem for Galloway, however, was that this sizeable unprotected tract lay within the larger preserved area.

The Waynesville watershed comprises 8,030 acres of forest land, about the size of the Biltmore Estate to the north near Asheville. The fast-running headwaters that gurgle down every incline toward the reservoir are clear and cold. The trees are huge and wildlife is plentiful; the area contains two State-designated Natural Areas that house unique plant and animal communities. And the property provides breathtaking scenery along nearly 10 miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway.

To ensure the permanent protection of this amazing natural resource, Galloway turned to several organizations he thought could help. He talked with the Conservation Trust for North Carolina (CTNC), Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy (SAHC), Mainspring Conservation Trust, the NC Land and Water Fund, and Western Carolina University. The groups hatched a plan to provide stronger safeguards for the entire watershed, including the acquisition of a 691-acre privately owned tract within the watershed.

“We wanted to protect public health by keeping our drinking water supplies as clean as possible. At the same time, we wanted to support the local tourism economy by preserving the stunning views from the Blue Ridge Parkway,” Galloway says. “We came up with an agreement that enabled Waynesville to grow while still protecting the area’s ecological diversity, scenic views and primary source of clean, safe drinking water.”

During a sometimes arduous process, the project partners’ persistence and creativity enabled them to overcome numerous hurdles along the way to protecting  the watershed.  They secured grant funding from the State Division of Water Quality, NC Land and Water Fund, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. They reviewed and revised dozens of drafts of two conservation agreements (easements) that addressed different areas within the watershed.  The Town of Waynesville’s Board of Aldermen held public hearings and voted to approve the easements.

In 2005, after eight years of hard work by the partners, the Waynesville Watershed was permanently protected. Today, the Town owns all 8,030 acres. CTNC and SAHC jointly hold and manage a conservation agreement on 7,339 acres and the NC Land and Water Fund holds an easement on the 691-acre tract. Land trust staff visit the watershed every year to ensure the easements’ terms are being upheld. Shortly after consummation of the deal, the partners prepared a comprehensive biological inventory and forest management plan. Limited forest management is allowed on the larger tract, guided by the plan, while the smaller property is held under a “forever wild” easement. Public access is allowed from time to time on town-guided educational tours.

“We know that it’s far more cost-effective to keep drinking water supplies clean by safeguarding land within the watershed, rather than cleaning up polluted waters entering our reservoir,” Galloway said. “This project is a great example of public and private partners working together – persistently and cooperatively – to overcome obstacles and leverage their resources for the good of our citizens.”

Thanks to long-standing efforts to protect the streams and underground springs that feed the reservoir, the Waynesville Watershed has earned the highest quality ranking the state can assign a drinking water source. The forested, undeveloped land is also able to efficiently trap rainfall to gradually fill the reservoir, meaning the town’s water supply is particularly resilient to extended droughts as well as intense heavy rain events.

This partnership is a model for what can be accomplished when land trusts, landowners, government agencies, and academic institutions join forces to build community resilience through the power of conservation solutions.

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