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To: The Land Trust Policy Network
From: Althea Dotzour, Outreach and Policy Coordinator, Gathering Waters Conservancy
Re: FRPP Budget Update
Hi Everyone,I received the following alert about the Farm Bill and future FRPP funding from the Land Trust Alliance asking us to contact our senators this week to ensure strong funding. Senator Kohl can be reached at (202) 224-5653 and Senator Feingold can be reached at (202) 224-5323.
Gathering Waters' FRPP webapge has copies of the letters we've sent to our delegates earlier this year and some additional information on the successes of the program in Wisconsin. Over the life of FRPP, Wisconsin groups have successfully competed to receive $10 million in financial assistance. This money has protected over 9,200 acres (64 farms) in 11 counties around the state.
Thanks for your help! Please let me know when you talk to our legislators so I can reference those conversations when I work with our Senators in the future.
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The Senate Agriculture Committee will take up the Farm Bill soon - and your voice is needed to ensure adequate funding for conservation programs including the Farm and Ranchland Protection Program (FRPP) and Grasslands Reserve Program (GRP). These programs help land trusts and state and county farmland protection programs purchase conservation easements to protect working ag lands.
The competition for Farm Bill funding is fierce, and your phone call is needed this week. A broad coalition of conservation organizations, including American Farmland Trust, Ducks Unlimited, National Audubon Society, and the National Wildlife Federation have asked their members to call their Senators and ask them to support expanded funding for the Farm Bill's conservation programs. Please add the voice of your land trust!
Who to call: Your Senators natural resources staff! To get contact information for your Senators, go to: http://www.senate.gov/ , select your state in the upper right hand corner, and click on "go"!
What to ask for:
- Tell them who you are and what you do for land conservation in their state!
- Ask them to support at least as much funding for conservation programs as the House-passed bill!
- Remind them that there is a huge demand for these programs - two of three farmers who apply are rejected for lack of funds.
- Remind them that these programs benefit not just the farmer, but the entire community! They provide clean water, wildlife habitat and open space, as well as ensuring the continuation of agriculture.
- If you've ever worked with a landowner on an FRPP project, tell them about it, and how you'd love to be able to do more!
- Be sure to thank them for their time – and ask them to come see the work your land trust has done!
Their phones may well be busy - but keep trying! You may also want to FAX them a note.
More background information:
Both the House and Senate have proposed to solve major problems land trusts and landowners have had with how the FRPP and GRP programs have been run. But on funding, there is still a stark difference. The House-passed farm bill increased conservation funding by $4.5 billion over the "budget baseline" - which enabled, among other things, a ramp-up in FRPP from the current $40 million to $280 million a year over the next five years. It also provided for an additional one million acres of land in GRP.
So far, the Senate committee has not proposed any more FRPP funding than was in the previous farm bill – less than $100 million a year, split up across the entire country. It has proposed a larger GRP - but unless the Senate provides $5 billion or more of new funding for conservation (over the five years of the farm bill) it won't be able to both increase GRP and provide for the House level of funding for FRPP - funding that is desperately needed to match state and local farmland protection efforts.
Conservation funding does far more than FRPP and GRP, of course - it is needed to grow the Wetlands Reserve Program, to keep the Conservation Reserve Program going, to fund state CREP programs, and to meet farmer demand for pollution-stopping EQIP grants. Those programs all have dedicated constituencies - but YOUR VOICE is needed to speak up for the conservation easement programs to protect working farm and ranch lands.
Thank you for your help! Tax Incentive Update Earlier this month, The Senate Finance Committee approved a permanent extension of the new incentive for conservation easements again - this time as part of a package of tax measures designed to be attached to the Farm Bill! Your call for conservation funding for the Farm Bill helps ensure that the Senate farm bill ends up helping conservation with both funding and tax incentives to move conservation forward.
Russ Shay Lynne Sherrod
Director of Public Policy Western Policy Manager
rshay@lta.org lsherrod@lta.org
Land Trust Alliance
Sign up to be a Land Trust ADVOCATE at: http://www.lta.org/publicpolicy/advocates.htm
Land Trust Alliance ~ 1660 L St. NW, Suite 1100 ~ Washington DC, 20036 ~ (202) 638-4725
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