Land Trust Alliance Education Grant

Description

This is a single source grant in the amount of $30,000 that will be awarded to the Land Trust Alliance. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will not be substantially involved in this project. With U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service funds, the Alliance will support educational programming for the land trust community and partners. The Land Trust Allianceâ¿¿s educational objectives are to: 1) strengthen the land conservation community through training opportunities; 2) foster a peer network for engagement and sharing of ideas; 3) celebrate conservation successes and identify strategies for emerging challenges; and 4) rejuvenate a dedicated community of land conservationists. In addition, the Alliance will engage partners, including federal agencies, to share information with land trusts about how to work effectively with a variety of programs, initiatives and funding sources.Through Education programs in 2017, the Alliance will:â¿¢ Support the community of practice for land conservation through training opportunities for 1,000 land trusts and their federal agency partners, as well as special opportunities to engage new and critical stakeholders in land conservation efforts around the country. The Alliance will support the exchange of information and ideas through a variety of training opportunities in 2017 including Rally: the National Land Conservation Conference (Rally), 30 webinars, the Symposium on Advanced Legal Topics in Land Conservation, regional training events and through the online Learning Center (which will be replaced and upgraded in 2017). o As part of Rally, the Alliance will offer: the annual Federal Leaders Luncheon and will again host the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Serviceâ¿¿s National Land Protection Award. â¿¢ Develop and disseminate new and updated content for Land Trust Standards and Practices, the ethical and technical guidelines for the responsible operation of a land trust. The Standards were revised in February 2017 to reflect changes to the current operational and legal environment for land conservation in the U.S. (first major revision in a decade). The Alliance has initiated a plan to develop new and updated content to assist land trusts in implementing the critical revisions to the 12 Standards and their 146 elements.â¿¢ Develop and update Land Conservation Case Law Summaries and other resources in our legal clearinghouse to reflect the latest legal information affecting land conservation. This will include cases from around the country that involve conservation land or easements and land trusts. The Allianceâ¿¿s Case Law Summaries are updated approximately every four months by a deeply experienced conservation and tax attorney. The November 2016 update (484 pp.) revealed there are 478 total cases, including 14 new cases and 5 updated cases defining the legal environment for land conservation work in America. The Case Law Summaries are available through the Allianceâ¿¿s online Conservation Defense Clearinghouse, a comprehensive conservation defense resource with information on cases, practical tips, law review articles, statutes, and tax code and sample documents. For attorneys and experienced practitioners, the clearinghouse is a necessary tool for understanding difficult issues in the field, tracking case law development and crafting winning arguments in a legal challenge. â¿¢ Provide timely and accurate answers to information requests on a variety of subjects related to land conservation. In 2016, the Alliance received and responded to more than 1,600 information requests through the public website and the online Learning Center on topics such as landowner options for conserving land, finding Alliance member land trusts to partner for land conservation acquisition, transactional due diligence, baseline documentation and conservation defense. In addition, the Alliance provides online forums (also referred to as communities of practice) moderated by subject matter experts to provide guidance, answer questions and share information in a timely fashion with conservation practitioners. This award is entered into under the Service Training and Technical Assistance (Generic Training) CFDA (15.649) and is made under the authority of the Fish and Wildlife Act of 1956 and the Fish and Wildlife Coordination Act, for the development and implementation of programs for the benefit of fish and wildlife species and their habitat (16 U.S.C. 661 and 742 et seq.), Fish and Wildlife Improvement Act of 1978, as amended (16 U.S.C. 753). Endangered Species Act of 1973 (16 U.S.C. 1531-1544, 87 Stat. 884).

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