Land trust
Land trusts are nonprofit organizations which own and manage land, and sometimes waters. There are three common types of land trust, distinguished from one another by the ways in which they are legally structured and by the purposes for which they are organized and operated:
- A real estate investment trust is a fiduciary arrangement whereby one party (the trustee) agrees to own and to manage real property for the benefit of a limited number of beneficiaries.
- A community land trust (CLT) is a private, nonprofit corporation that acquires, manages, and develops land for a variety of purposes, primarily for the production and stewardship of affordable housing, although many CLTs are also engaged in non-residential buildings and uses.
- A conservation land trust is a private, non-profit corporation in the US that acquires land or conservation easements for the purpose of limiting commercial development and preserving open space, natural areas, waterways, and/or productive farms and forests.
In the United States, the land owned by the
In Australia, Aboriginal land trusts are a type of non-profit organisation that holds the freehold title to an area of land on behalf of a community of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people.
History
Ancient example
Possible earliest concept of equity in land held in trust is the depiction of this ancient king (trustor) which grants property back to its previous owner (beneficiary) during his absence, supported by witness testimony (trustee). In essence and in this case, the king, in place of the later state (trustor and holder of assets at highest position) issues ownership along with past proceeds (equity) back to the beneficiary:[1]
On the testimony of Gehazi the servant of Elisha that the woman was the owner of these lands, the king returns all her property to her. From the fact that the king orders his eunuch to return to the woman all her property and the produce of her land from the time that she left ...
Roman era
Land trusts have been around at least since
United States
In late 19th-century
Land trusts have been actively used in
Types
Community land trusts
Community land trusts trace their conceptual history to England’s Garden Cities, India's
Real estate investment trusts
A real estate investment trust is a fiduciary arrangement whereby one party (the trustee) agrees to own and to manage real property for the benefit of a limited number of beneficiaries.[4]
Conservation land trusts
Land trusts used primarily for the protection and stewardship of natural areas or for the preservation of productive lands for food or fiber are most commonly called conservation land trusts, but may also be called 'land conservancies. They have been in existence since 1891. However, conservation land trusts were not well known before the 1980s.
History
The first conservation land trust The Trustees of Reservations was founded in 1891. In 1976, Ben Emory, new director of the Maine Coast Heritage Trust, had begun to call on Boston lawyer Kingsbury Browne for advice on federal tax issues related to conservation easements. Emory recruited a handful of other land trusts as clients for Browne’s periodic tax letters, and a small communications network of land trusts evolved.
When Congress considered new legislation relating to tax deductibility of easements, the Brandywine Conservancy, led by Bill Sellers, convened land trusts using easements in December 1979. Browne invited the under-secretary of the Treasury for tax policy, who brought IRS staff Stephen Small. The land trusts agreed to hire lobbyists and coordinate efforts to influence the legislation, winning expansion of the conservation purposes for which easements would qualify for deductibility.[citation needed]
Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, the Trust for Public Land sponsored a small gathering in San Francisco of established and newly forming Western land trusts in February 1978.[citation needed]
By 1980, more than 400 local and regional land trusts existed, most still in the North-east, three-fourths with no paid staff, and half with annual budgets under $50,000. The majority of land was protected by fee ownership, but the use of conservation easements was growing.[citation needed]
Then influences converged: the geographic spread resulting in isolation of newer land trusts; recognition of the difficulty of influencing vital legislation; and the growing engagement of Kingsbury Browne in land conservation, leading to his desire to learn about land trusts across the country. A movement was about to be born.[citation needed]
The number of land trusts steadily increased in the United States, with most forming in the late twentieth century. There are also land trusts working in Canada (e.g. Nature Conservancy of Canada, Escarpment Biosphere Conservancy, Wildlife Preservation Canada, Edmonton & Area Land Trust, Ecotrust Canada, Georgian Bay Land Trust and Thames Talbot Land Trust), Mexico, and other countries worldwide, in addition to international land trusts like The Nature Conservancy and the World Land Trust.[citation needed]
Aims
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The goal of conservation trusts is to preserve sensitive natural areas, farmland, ranchland, water sources, cultural resources or notable landmarks. These include enormous international organizations such as
Land trusts conserve all different types of land. Some protect only farmland or ranchland, others forests, mountains, prairies, deserts, wildlife habitat, cultural resources such as archaeological sites or battlefields, urban parks, scenic corridors, coastlines, wetlands or waterways; it is up to each organization to decide what type of land to protect according to its mission. Some areas have extremely limited public access for the protection of sensitive wildlife, or to allow recovery of damaged ecosystems. [citation needed]
Many protected areas are under private ownership, which tends to limit access. However, in many cases, land trusts work to eventually open up the land in a limited way to the public for recreation in the form of hunting, hiking, camping, wildlife observation, watersports, or other responsible outdoor activities.
Strategies
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Many different strategies are used to provide this protection, including outright acquisition of the land by the trust. In other cases, the land will remain in private hands, but the trust will purchase a conservation easement on the property to prevent development, or purchase any mining, logging, drilling, or development rights on the land. Trusts also provide funding to assist like-minded private buyers or government organizations to purchase and protect the land forever.[citation needed]
As
When land is acquired, trusts will sometimes retain ownership of the land in perpetuity, or sell the land to a third party. This third party is often the government, which will usually add the land to an existing protected area, or create a new one entirely. Land trusts were instrumental in the 2004 creation of
Land trusts use many different tools in their protection efforts. Land trusts buy or accept donations of land in fee. This means that the landowner will sell fee simple interest to the land trust or will just give the land they own to an organization. Landowners may also sell or donate a conservation easement to a land trust. [citation needed]
A landowner that donates a conservation easement to a land trust gives up some of the rights associated with the land. For example, the landowner might give up the right to build additional structures, while retaining the right to grow crops. Future owners also will be bound by the conservation easement's terms. The land trust is responsible for making sure the easement's terms are followed. This is done through monitoring of the land.[citation needed]
Conservation easements offer great flexibility. An easement on property containing rare wildlife habitat might prohibit any development, for example, while an easement on a working farm might allow the addition of agricultural structures. An easement may apply to all or a portion of the property, and need not require public access. Each conservation easement is carefully crafted to meet the needs of the landowner while not jeopardizing the conservation values of the land.[8][page needed]
In between selling land or an easement to a land trust is an option called a bargain sale. A bargain sale is where a landowner sells a property interest to an organization for less than the market price. The amount of value between the market price and the actual sale price is considered a donation to the organization. There are other strategies to conserve land as well.[9][page needed]
In October 2002, Property and Environment Research Center published a report by Dominic P. Parker entitled Cost-Effective Strategies for Conserving Private Land. This paper identified numerous ways for operating land trusts more efficiently, pointing out that conservation easement and other tools for land preservation may be less costly than ownership. Sometimes the various rights associated with land ownership are separable. A preservationist organization may, for instance, buy only the extraction rights on a property with oil or minerals, and then rent those rights to extracters on the organization's terms. The terms might include requirements to protect the environment and pay the organization royalties on materials extracted. Many land trust organizations had already been using these strategies for years when this report was published.[citation needed]
Structure
The
), with protected land increasing 147% to 1.5 million acres (6,100 km2) in 2003.Other types
In the United States; approximately 230,000 square kilometres (89,000 sq mi) (as of 2008) of land are owned by the
In Australia, Aboriginal land trusts are a type of non-profit organisation that holds the freehold title to an area of land on behalf of a community of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people.[12][13]
See also
- Conservation community
- Cooperative
- Green belt
- Intentional community
References
- ^ Ben-Barak, Zafrira. "Meribaal and the System of Land Grants in Ancient Israel." Biblica (1981): 73-91.
- ^ "Abusive Trust Tax Evasion Schemes - Special Types of Trusts" IRS.gov website [retrieved 11 September 2011] Archived 18 June 2012 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Swann, R.S. (1972). The Community Land Trust: A Guide To A New Model For Land Tenure In America. Cambridge, MA: Center for Community Economic Development. p. xiii. 2007 reprint.
- ^ a b Aldrich, R. & Wyerman, J. 2005 National Land Trust Census Report Archived 24 July 2013 at the Wayback Machine (2006), Land Trust Alliance
- ^ a b Brewer, R. Conservancy, The Land Trust Movement in America (2003) Lebanon, NH: Dartmouth College Press.
- ^ a b Loza, Andrew. "What is a Land Trust". ConservationTools.org. Pennsylvania Land Trust Association. Retrieved 28 March 2017.
- ^ "Public Access Policies and Practices for Land Trusts". ConservationTools.org. Pennsylvania Land Trust Association. Retrieved 18 October 2013.
- ^ Elizabeth Byers and Karin Marchetti Ponte. The Conservation Easement Handbook (2005) The Trust for Public Land and the Land Trust Alliance
- ^ Trust for Public Land. Doing Deals: A Guide to Buying Land for Conservation (1995) Washington, DC: Land Trust Alliance
- ^ kseese (13 May 2015). "National Land Trust Census". lta.org. Retrieved 21 March 2018.
- ^ U.S. Department of the Interior. Office of the Special Trustee. History. "DOI Office of the Special Trustee (OST) for American Indians » About OST » History". Archived from the original on 9 December 2008. Retrieved 14 November 2008.
- ^ "Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander land". Austrade. 26 February 2016. Retrieved 10 January 2021.
- ^ "Aboriginal Lands Trust Act 1966 (SA)". Documenting A Democracy. Museum of Australian Democracy. Retrieved 10 January 2021.