The Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation

The Peter and Carmen Lucia Buck Foundation

Qualities theFoundation Looks forIn Land Conservation Organizations it Supports

Bob Canace, Program Officer

Land Conservation Sector and Program Related Investments

The PCLB Foundation believes the conservation of open space and smart approaches to planning and development are critical to the quality of life and to having vibrant communities. We therefore make grants to organizations working to conserve land and promote smart growth in New York’s Hudson River Valley region, and to a more limited extent in Connecticut. Priority is given to conservation organizations that work directly and strategically to create or connect key corridors of open space, provide the public with meaningful outdoor experiences, and preserve productive farmland, as well as to a select group of organizations whose work has a direct impact upon the success of these efforts through advocacy, training, and other forms of support.
We also make Program Related Investments in the form of low-interest, short- and long-term loans to conservation organizations to acquire land and conservation easements. Loans are available to current grantees in New York and on a case-by-case basis in Connecticut. Applications are invited within the Foundation’s scheduled grant cycles, although special circumstances may warrant an off-cycle loan.

Current Foundation Criteria for Selecting Grantees

The Foundation supports a total of 24 grantees in itsLand Conservation Sector,19of which are land trusts carrying out the basicwork of conserving land, while the other 5 organizations are involved in supporting these efforts through advocacy and/or educating the public about the importance of conservation. The following criteriadescribe the types of organizations that the Foundation is willing to support:

Local conservation organizations active in the Hudson River Valley and Connecticut.
Key organizations making the most progress in the Hudson River Valley and Connecticut.
National and global organizations which are active in the Hudson River Valley and Connecticut.
Organizations that support and advocate for the work of conservation groups.

Common Elements of Effective Grantees

Foundations like to support groups that help the foundation advance is stated mission. Among the many land conservation organizations within the geographic region supported by the Foundation some may be considered to be more effective than others. There are some organizational elements common to the grantees who are most effective and who the Foundation has chosen to support. These can generally be defined as organizations that have a history of success, are currently active, adapt to change, are expanding programs, and are forward looking. There appear to be some basic elements that these highly effective land conservation organizations have in common:

DynamicLeadership: Effective organizations respond to the experience, charisma, organizational skills, and vision of a dynamic leader. The leader may or may not have been in place for a long time, but typically has extensive experience in the land conservation field. Leaders of effective land conservation organizations are typically full-time professionals employed by the organization, place significant emphasis on strategic planning, look for opportunities to forge partnerships with other organizations, and have the ability to clearly define their organization’s purpose and direction.
Critical Staff: In addition to an Executive Director, effective land conservation organizations appear to have the following essential staff in place, usually but notnecessarily, on a full-time basis: (1) Administrator; (2) Development/Outreach Director; (3) Land Protection Specialist; (4) Land Steward; (5) Program Coordinator. These organizations make effective use of interns and volunteers to assist these critical staff members and the board.
Fluid and Growing Board of Directors: Although there is no common formula, the organizations that continue to progress toward their primary mission adapt to changing circumstances and continue to evaluate the composition of their Board relative to their needs and opportunities. Most have emphasized their concerted efforts to diversify their Boards, adding individuals with keys skills in areas of perceived need or deficiency. Many have instituted Board succession policies to bring “new blood” to the Board on a regular basis and avoid “founder’s syndrome,” wherein Board members may resist change. In addition, many of the more effective organizations have increasingly assigned Board members to specific program needs or linked them with volunteers or interns to increase vertical communication within the organization.
Active Partnerships:The more effective organizations actively seek and maintain partners, and understand their respective roles. An organization’s reach is limited by its mission statement, internal policies, resources, and priorities. Forging partnerships can frequently overcome such shortcomings by expanding contacts, funding opportunities, and stewardship possibilities, as well as creating a stronger political base. The degree to which grantees interact to achieve their individual goals has been one of the more encouraging findings from site visit interviews.
Optimism and Adaptability:Although all land conservation organizations are cognizant of the challenging economic environment in which they are currently operating, the more effective organizations are actively seeking alternatives tocontinue to accomplish their mission and expand programs. They continue to make progress toward preserving land by taking advantage of available resources, such as federal funds and select foundation funds, and identifying landowners willing to consider full or partial donation of land and easements. They have also recognizedpopular trends such as an increasing demand for local food, interest in agri-tourism, and interest and need for outdoor education to expand their base of support.
Sense of Professional Responsibility: The more highly evolved land conservation organizations have embraced Land Trust Alliance Accreditation and land stewardship. Not all grantees have achieved accreditation, but several of those that have not have made a conscious effort to obtain the resources needed and are going through the process. Each has pointed to some benefit(s) brought about simply by pursuing accreditation, whether or not it has yet been achieved. Responsible land stewardship is valued and carried out by the more progressive organizations. Concerted efforts have been made to add stewardship staff, give land stewards the tools and help they need to be effective (volunteers, Board members, and equipment), and raise stewardship endowments to realistic levels to carry out annual monitoring of easements and provide for easement defense.

Defining Success

PCLB’s grantees define success for themselves and their colleagues in several ways. Most of these definitions are subjective, but they can be assessed qualitatively. Based on conversations with grantees the following appear to be common ways organizations describe what they consider successful outcomes:

Land Protection: Acquiring quality and interconnected open space and farmland and saving land in danger of development.
Smart Growth: Towns and counties direct developers to land conservation organization prior to the submission of development plans. Towns rely on conservation organizations to shape their open space and farmland preservation plans and zoning.
Financial Resources: The state protects funding for open space and farmland preservation from being reprogrammed into the general treasury, increases funding to clear out the backlog of projects, and solves the legal bottleneck that slows projects down. The process by which towns and counties can establish community preservation funds is modified by the state to give more local control to local funding, and towns and counties move to make these funds available. The Foundation continues to provide general support to allow flexibility and loans to facilitate closings.
Farm Economy: The land conservation community becomes organized around a central program concept to make land affordable to young farmers and continues to help promote farm markets.
Partnerships: Conservation organizations continue to take advantage of the cooperative relationships they’ve built over the years to orchestrate projects using the unique capabilities of diverse organizations with common interests, assist smaller organizations through shared services, and continue to present a unified voice in Albany and Washington.

Measuring Success

Being able to quantify some or all of the above goals would facilitate the Foundation’s ability to assess both the absolute and relative performance of land conservation grantees, which would in turn provide a firm footing on which to base decisions on who to fund and relative funding amounts. Some caution is warranted in attempting to quantify progress in the land conservation field. It is important to emphasize quality over quantity. For example, a simple metric that could be applied is how many acres each organization preserves each year. But the conservation value of land is important to these organizations, so one needs to tie performance measures to organizational missions and examine the importance of individual projects to past accomplishments and complimentary goals, such as smart growth. Another reality is that factors beyond the organizations’ control greatly affect their ability to bring projects to closing. Examples include unforeseen issues with survey, title, family matters, political winds, and the availability of funding. These factors notwithstanding, measures such as how many landowners are solicited each year, how many projects are in the “pipeline” (actively being appraised, surveyed, assessed and negotiated), and how many are prepared to close would constitute fair metrics.