Protecting 1.3 Million Acres

The Cascade Agenda calls for finding creative ways to save land.  Directly acquiring more than a million acres would require billions of philanthropic and government dollars.  In contrast, incentives-based conservation allows us to use business models and market forces to protect land.

To achieve this level of conservation, Cascade Land Conservancy is developing and testing innovative new conservation strategies that we have already used to conserve 120,000 acres.  Now it is time to bring our tools to the marketplace at full scale.  Given the rising cost of land, we must refine and pilot these conservation strategies in 5 years in order to reach our goal of protecting 1.3 million acres.

Innovative, Market-Based Conservation Strategies

Value Added Conservation

Cascade Land Conservancy and our many partners will bring bottom line value to land transactions that include significant conservation.  Examples include residential developments that create homes on only a small area of a parcel and permanently protect large swaths of forests and farms on the remaining sections.

Conservation Financing Tools

We will develop creative new programs to finance the conservation of working farms and forests leveraging their long-term revenue potential.  Examples of specific strategies include establishing a Public Development Authority to acquire working forest land and allowing non-profits to issue Community Forest Bonds to finance conservation land acquisitions.

New Conservation Markets

We will develop new conservation markets that provide revenue streams for foresters and farmers and allow us all to achieve our shared conservation goals.  Examples of markets include transfering property development rights from farms and forests to our cities and towns and trading carbon "credits" based on a forests ability to trap these gases that cause climate change.