Land trusts play a critical role in protecting, restoring and stewarding water quality, and most identify water quality as a key driver for their conservation efforts. These goals align with public priorities; polling conducted by The Nature Conservancy suggests that voters prioritize water as a critical reason to engage in conservation, with 87% reporting it as very important to protect our drinking water quality.
This session will review several case studies of large-scale habitat restoration projects completed by the Black Swamp Conservancy in the western Lake Erie Basin. These projects are driven by water quality improvements, but also provide critical benefits to wildlife and expand opportunities for public recreation and education. The session will discuss targeting of land for restoration purposes, including the development of a GIS model funded by Land Trust Alliance’s Great Lakes Water Quality Pilot Project. Finally, this session will discuss the unique challenges related to funding and managing these projects for land trusts thinking about undertaking large-scale restoration projects.