Bob Lazaro
PEC Director of Communications
571.225.0198

2474 Acres Conserved in Orange County in 2008
Over 300,000 Acres Conserved in the Piedmont

In 2008, residents of the Piedmont protected 14100 acres of open space through the use of conservation easements. In Orange County, 2474 more acres were preserved in 2008 increasing the area of privately conserved land in the County to over 27,000 acres (map attached).

The movement to protect privately-held rural land from development has been experiencing tremendous momentum in Virginia's Piedmont region, with landowners conserving an average of 23,714 acres every year for the last five years. The total for 2008 brings the number of acres conserved within the nine counties served by the Piedmont Environmental Council (PEC) to 307464 acres, an acreage that is larger than Shenandoah National Park.

"We're immensely pleased at what communities in the Piedmont have been able to accomplish to provide a legacy of conserved open space for our children and future generations," says Chris Miller, President of PEC. "When it comes to conservation, this is one of the most successful regions in the entire country."

The Piedmont region continues to lead the state of Virginia, which is among the top five states in the nation for protecting land through private conservation easements. The nine counties of Virginia's Piedmont -- including Loudoun, Clarke, Fauquier, Culpeper, Rappahannock, Madison, Orange, Greene, and Albemarle -- have conserved more land than almost any state in the nation.

PEC's Director of Land Conservation, Heather Richards says, "The tremendous gains we've seen in conservation over the last few years reflect the growing awareness among Orange's residents of the importance of their landscape. Conserving green spaces does more than just protecting pretty views. It protects drinking water and air quality, reduces traffic, keeps taxes down and preserves family farms. These benefits are explicitly recognized in Orange County's Comprehensive Plan."

Bob Lee, the Executive Director of the Virginia Outdoors Foundation (VOF) said, "VOF had its second best year in 2008 in terms of conservation easement acreage - 64,840 acres in 64 localities. This land conservation movement that was incubated in the nine-county PEC region has now expanded throughout Virginia. VOF has done more land conservation in the last four years, since 2004, than was accomplished in the previous 38 years. VOF now has over 525,000 acres under permanent conservation protection - this represents an area more than half as large as the state of Rhode Island. The PEC coordination model with VOF has now spread to other land trusts and conservation organizations throughout Virginia. Today, VOF holds easements in 102 cities and counties."

According to a 2003 study that was done by the American Farmland Trust in Culpeper County, farms and other open lands use only $0.32 in local services for every dollar of taxes paid, while homes require $1.22 for every dollar paid. Land placed under permanent easement also improves the results of the formula used by the state to determine local ability to pay, which increases funding from the Commonwealth for schools and other county services.

Easements also support two major industries of the Piedmont: agriculture and tourism. Like other landowners, farmers can gain needed capital by voluntarily conserving their land and earning a substantial state tax credit which they may either use or sell on the open market. Farmers also benefit from reduced appraisal values on their land, which lightens their tax burden. In Albemarle, Clarke, and Fauquier counties, working farms also have the option of receiving money from publicly supported Purchase of Development Rights (PDR) programs.

"Those who put their land under conservation easements are the true champions of preserving these values we all hold dear," said Abby Harper, PEC's Land Conservation Officer for Orange County. "Orange County needs to consider adopting a PDR (purchase of development rights) program in order to ensure that landowners are receiving the benefit of all the land conservation options available to them. The PDR program, which cost shares with localities from both state and federal programs, offers landowners direct payment for their development rights. This may be an attractive option for those who cannot take full advantage of the incentives offered through conservation easements," concluded Harper.

For information about land conservation in Orange County you can contact Abby Harper at 540.672.0141 or via email aharper[at]pecva.org.