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How Land Preservation Works

© Kenneth Friedman

The benefit of donating a conservation easement--donating development rights--comes from the tax benefit a donor receives. When the landowner donates to a nonprofit agency or to the government, the landowner can deduct the fair market value of the land as an immediate tax deduction. The landowner also can request that the land be reassessed so that real estate taxes will be reduced. There can be several other benefits of donating a conservation easement besides earning money and reducing real estate taxes. A landowner may wish to do any of the following:

• prevent heirs from selling and developing the property,
• reduce estate taxes by removing the value of the conservation easement from the estate,
• guarantee that "open space" remains in perpetuity (forever) around another piece of property on which there is a home, farm or other developed use
• serve as a role model for neighboring landowners to convince them to donate easements on their property (for example, combining easements along a stream)
• join with others in a common preservation project, such as along a stream
• have the easement holder (nonprofit agency, government) manage the land for conservation

Generally, to protect the integrity of conservation easement, it should be sold or donated to an agency, such as a land conservancy or a land trust, with enough power or authority to enforce the easement. In other words, suppose you donate an easement to a small organization of volunteers with no money. Now, suppose a neighboring property owner decides to cut down the trees within that conservation easement property, or decides to cut the brush and mow the grasses. Without an individual or an agency to keep an eye on what happens on that easement property, its value as preserved land could be ruined. In a similar manner, donated property should be given only to an agency with enough resources to hold, manage and protect it. Many donors designate a second recipient just in case the first goes out of business.

Besides creating voluntary conservation easements by sale or donation, an easement or a defacto easement can be created forcibly by a zoning commission, planning agency or an equivalent government agency. What these agencies do is force a developer to dedicate a certain amount of land as permanent open space as a condition of approval for construction plans. Many communities employ this technique to protect community waterways, groundwater, wood lots, wetlands, vistas or other natural resources, to reduce runoff, to reduce crowding or contain sprawl, to create set-backs (buildings set back from the street) to preserve views or reduce noise, to maintain a certain community atmosphere, or to provide for community walkways, bike paths and bridle paths.