3,000 Acres Protected in Maine : Land Trusts Catch On in New England as Way to Preserve Natural Areas

Hay fields slope gently toward the shore as the oldest farm in Freeport remains true to its agricultural heritage. It’s a reminder of what the fast-growing town looked like before developers turned it into a bedroom suburb.

In Kennebunkport, the summer tourist haven 40 miles down the coast, a tiny piece of riverside parkland dotted with benches serves as an oasis for anyone seeking a respite from the commercial bustle downtown.

A 45-acre parcel of pine, hemlock and hardwood in the center of Orono is a popular spot for cross-country skiing, jogging or a simple walk in the woods. Much of the college town’s open space has been turned into residential subdivisions in recent years; the wooded tract is the last undeveloped land in the neighborhood.

At a time when Maine is under unprecedented pressure for commercial and residential development, each of these areas has been protected--not just for this year or next, but for all time.

Local Land Trusts Set Up

In all three cases, the initiative came from conservation-minded residents who banded together to establish local land trusts--private, nonprofit organizations that are preserving Maine’s landscape, a few acres at a time.

Quietly and with little fanfare, the trusts are locking up pieces of real estate deemed valuable to future generations: a meadow here, a deer yard there, boggy wetlands, prime birding areas, sometimes just a patch of green in a sea of concrete.

At last count, local land trusts have protected about 3,000 acres in Maine. Most activity has centered on the southern Maine coast, the area where development pressure has been strongest. But in recent years the interest in land trusts has spread to the entire Maine coast and some inland sections.

The community-based organizations employ various means to achieve their goals: They accept donations from philanthropic landowners, take advantage of bargain purchases and--most frequently--employ a device known as a conservation easement.

The easement process, which confers tax benefits in return for a landowner’s acceptance of restrictions on the property, combines altruism and self-interest.

Outright Purchases Rare

Outright purchases are the exception, not the rule. Donations, either of easements or of the land itself, account for most of the lands brought under protection. Among the donors is Vice President George Bush, who granted an easement that restricts development at his family’s compound at Walkers Point.

Land trusts are growing rapidly, particularly in Maine and the rest of New England. About half of the nation’s 500-odd land trusts are in New England; Connecticut alone accounts for 90 of them.

Maine’s first local trust was established on Monhegan Island in 1954, but only in recent years has the movement become widespread. The number of local and regional land trusts in Maine has jumped to 33 from 16 in 2 1/2 years, and there are nearly a dozen more in the planning stages.

“New England was the hub; it’s where the concept originated,” said James J. Espy Jr., associate director of the Maine Coast Heritage Trust, an organization that provides encouragement and technical assistance to many of Maine’s local land trusts.

Land trust organizers, citing political pressures, are reluctant to place their faith in zoning laws to achieve land conservation goals.

“You can change a zoning law. You can’t change an easement,” said Jack Aley, secretary of the Brunswick-Topsham Land Trust, a group that only recently received its tax-deductible status and is still in its infancy.

Community Spirit Lauded

Activists like Aley applaud the spirit of community involvement the movement seems to embody.

“It’s an extremely democratic process,” he said. “It really is old-style, grass-roots, let’s get the neighbors together and do something about a problem. It’s not government intervention.”

The Brunswick-Topsham trust is focusing on a survey of wildlife habitat to identify lands that would be suitable for protection. Aley is also looking at a potential greenbelt made up of 300 to 400 acres of undeveloped land that runs from Bowdoin College toward the sea. That corridor, if protected, could prove as valuable to Brunswick as Central Park is to New York, he said.

“The livability of a town is almost a function of how much open space there is in it. If we don’t move to get open space in this community now, the quality of life is going to be diminished,” he said.

The Freeport farm, the Kennebunkport park and the Orono forest are not unique real estate parcels that would tempt state officials to include them in land acquisition budgets or attract the interest of major environmental organizations.

But to people in these towns, preservation of such lands reflects the way of life they have come to cherish and hope to pass along to future generations.