FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Mitigation Bank passes important milestone in Snohomish County

The Cascade Land Conservancy, working closely with the Habitat Bank on the state’s first wetlands mitigation bank, has been granted a conservation easement on 225 acres of wetlands valued at about $850,000 in Snohomish County, a milestone in the growing program of mitigation banking in Washington State.

Habitat Bank, a private mitigation bank, granted the easement on the land, situated in the lower Snoqualmie River, just north of King-Snohomish county line. Snohomish Habitat Bank is the first private wetland mitigation bank to be approved in Washington State.  The land is in the river’s floodplain and will be restored to historic wetland conditions, providing habitat for endangered salmon and waterfowl.

Over the last several years, Peggy Bill, CLC Snohomish County Senior Conservation Director, has worked to promote and advance mitigation banking, a private market based approach for conservation and restoration of critical habitat, especially wetlands.

Mitigation banks enable developers whose projects result in unavoidable impacts to wetlands to buy "credits" in an approved wetland mitigation bank instead of mitigating for impacts on-site   The Snohomish Habitat Bank has been approved to sell mitigation "credits" to compensate for approved impacts in the Snohomish River Basin.

"I am very excited about wetland banking," said Jay Manning, Ecology's director. "It holds great promise as a way to improve our ability to protect and restore diverse wetland systems, which are critically important to the environment in which we live. Equally exciting is the fact that wetland banking provides a less costly, faster and more predictable process for people to follow in developing their property."

“The bank will restore a mosaic of wetland habitat important for a diversity of species, including endangered salmon, migratory waterfowl, raptors and amphibians,” said Bill.

Bill said mitigation banks offer market-based conservation solutions that balance ecological, cultural and economic gains.

Mitigation banks will be an important tool for the Cascade Agenda, which uses market-based techniques to achieve large scale land conservation.  The Agenda is a program to conserve 1.3 million acres in the four county area, including Snohomish County.

The concept of Wetland Mitigation Banking was introduced in the early 1980’s as an alternative to on-site mitigation for unavoidable impacts to wetlands. Numerous studies had documented the failure of the majority of on-site mitigation projects to adequately replace impacted wetland ecological functions.

Over the last few years, Washington State has been developing state standards for mitigation banks, and several pilot banks are currently being permitted.

Wetland mitigation banks offer an alternative to in-kind, on-site mitigation by allowing private entrepreneurs to purchase and restore diverse wetlands and then sell "credits" to compensate for unavoidable impacts to wetlands.  Site selection and restoration of each bank site is carefully reviewed by state and federal agencies to maximize the opportunity for success.

Long-term protection of the mitigation bank is ensured by requiring a perpetual conservation easement.  That’s where organizations such as the Cascade Land Conservancy come in. Long-term ecological success is enhanced by requiring the banker to fully fund an endowment for long-term management and stewardship of the wetland.

Conservation Banking has been used as an effective tool in several states to mitigate for impacts to habitat for threatened, endangered and priority species.

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