MADISON, Wisc.—Gathering Waters: Wisconsin’s Alliance for Land Trusts, honored The Conservation Fund as Wisconsin’s 2014 Land Trust of the Year, on September 25 at the Land Conservation Leadership Awards Celebration—Wisconsin’s premier conservation event.

The Conservation Fund is a national land trust dedicated to creating land and water protection strategies that balance environmental stewardship with economic vitality. The Fund’s Upper Midwest initiative has had a significant impact in Wisconsin. Known for its collaborative approach, The Conservation Fund’s work serves to enhance and protect air and water quality, wildlife habitat and public recreation areas that preserve connections to our natural, cultural and historical heritage—all while creating opportunities to enhance economic opportunities for nearby communities and sustain local jobs in the forestry industry.

Since the Fund opened its Upper Midwest office in 2005, it has nurtured public and private partnerships for the protection of large-scale forest and watershed conservation. Notably, The Conservation Fund played an integral role in the permanent protection of the Brule-St. Croix Legacy Forest, a working forest that will continue to provide more than 1,000 Wisconsin jobs and contribute to an annual economic impact of $34 million through employment, timber sales and taxes. Representing the largest private conservation project in Wisconsin’s state history, the conservation easement acquisition includes public access for hiking, fishing, trapping, cross-country skiing, hunting, and bird watching, 80 small lakes and ponds, 14 miles of streams, and 68,000 acres of pine barrens habitat, and stitches together over 950,000 acres of public and private conservation land. This is conservation at the landscape scale.

Among other achievements, the Fund established a partnership with Washburn County Lakes and Rivers Association (WCLRA) to purchase 263 acres along 2.5 miles of the Wild and Scenic Totogatic River for preservation. Pat Shifferd of WCLRA said, “The Conservation Fund provided encouragement, support, and most importantly, the skills needed to raise the large amount of money required and to shepherd the project through the grant application and land transfer process.”

Many of the Fund’s collaborative efforts, including the two aforementioned achievements, were made possible with funding from Wisconsin’s Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Fund. The Knowles-Nelson Stewardship Program established in 1989 provides critical funding for the protection of Wisconsin’s land and water resources while ensuring public access for nature-based outdoor activities including hunting, fishing and wildlife watching. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2011 National Survey of Hunting, Fishing and Wildlife-Associated Recreation, total expenditures related to these activities totaled $5.4 billion. Additionally, projects like the Brule-St Croix Legacy Forest, a working forest easement, help sustain three of Wisconsin’s top five manufacturing sectors related to the paper and printing industries according to the “Wisconsin Economic Future Study” published in 2013 and funded by the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation.

Without the collaborative efforts led by the Fund, vast tracts of land like these would be at risk for development, forever changing our Northwoods landscape and quality of life. Nearly 76,000 acres have been protected in Wisconsin as part of TCFs Upper Midwest initiative. This work, accomplished in less than 10 years, is absolutely phenomenal.

Gathering Waters has been honoring Wisconsin’s top conservation leaders with Land Conservation Leadership Awards since 2004. This event recognizes the outstanding accomplishments of individuals, policy makers, and land trusts who are working to protect the places that make Wisconsin special. The awards honor the power of committed citizens and offer inspiring examples of conservation success.
For registration information, visit www.gatheringwaters.org.

Gathering Waters’ mission is to help land trusts, landowners and communities protect the places that make Wisconsin special.

About The Conservation Fund
At The Conservation Fund, we make conservation work for America. By creating solutions that make environmental and economic sense, we are redefining conservation to demonstrate its essential role in our future prosperity. Top-ranked for efficiency and effectiveness, we have worked in all 50 states to protect more than 7.5 million acres of land since 1985.

Press Release Contacts
Ann Simonelli | The Conservation Fund | 703-908-5809 | asimonelli@conservationfund.org
Mike Strigel | Gathering Waters Conservancy | 608-251-9131 x 14 | mike@gatheringwaters.org