Rally 2016: The National Land Conservation Conference

With a growing focus on collaborative conservation and partnerships, the Land Trust Alliance will enhance the ability of private conservation partners to work with the Division to complete its mission in a cost⿐effective manner, particularly in a time when land acquisition funds are dropping. The Land Trust Alliance promotes voluntary private land conservation to benefit communities and natural systems, and represents more than 1,100⿐member land trusts across America. The Alliance⿿s mission - saving the places people love by strengthening land conservation across America - complements and often directly benefits the National Wildlife Refuge System. In Fiscal Year 2012, despite falling conservation budgets, nearly half the land that the Division acquired was donated, in both fee and easement, by private partners. Working with land trust partners significantly helped the Division to achieve those results. The Alliance provides its non⿐governmental members, as well as local, state and federal government partners, invaluable advice on all topics concerning voluntary land conservation. To that end, the funding being requested is intended for the Alliance to ensure that its members are educated on how to work directly with the USFWS ⿿ Division of Realty, with a particular emphasis on working with the National Wildlife Refuge System, to conserve land within the System⿿s boundaries. In effect, the Alliance is directly and indirectly teaching land trusts how to donate land to the National Wildlife Refuge System. The Alliance will use these funds primarily for education. Our goal is to ensure that land trusts have the skills to be effective land acquisition partners. The Alliance will offer a number of educational and training opportunities to land trust staffs, boards and volunteers to help land trusts become better informed about land conservation issues and more effective at conserving land. Land Trust Standards and Practices, the ethical and technical guidelines for the responsible operation of a land trust are a core component of the educational offerings. To ensure that land trusts have the skills to be effective land acquisition partners, among the topics addressed will be conservation finance strategies, project due diligence, protecting land for biodiversity, and protecting water resources through strategic conservation planning. While a registration fee is usually required for training activities, many of the trainings that the Alliance offers are subsidized by grants so that the trainings are affordable, or free, for members of the land trust community. 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. For example, workshops offered in the course of a year include topics such as ⿿The Land and Water Conservation Fund: Strategic Shifts and Interagency Collaboration to Support National Landscape Initiatives⿝ and ⿿The National Wildlife Refuge System; Partnering with Land Trusts and Local Governments.⿝ The Alliance⿿s website (http://www.landtrustalliance.org) provides descriptions of the various on⿐line and in⿐person training opportunities for land trusts. These include advanced legal training, state, regional and national in⿐person trainings, standards and practices curricula, and a host of webinars. Rally 2016: The National Land Conservation Conference Minneapolis, MN, October 28⿐30th Our premiere education event, the Alliance⿿s annual Rally was first established in 1985. Rally is the place for the land conservation community to get answers, skills and the right resources to achieve success. Rally 2016 will provide more than 120 workshops, in⿐depth seminars, field trips and special learning and networking events for approximately 1,500 people. It will offer basic, intermediate and advanced coursework taught by approximately 300 seasoned conservation professionals who serve as faculty. The Rally sessions offer creative, entrepreneurial approaches that can be put to use immediately, with a larger end⿐goal of fostering self⿐sustaining land trusts that are empowered to save more land. Rally provides a thorough grounding in the experience and methodologies of the land trust movement. Proven outcomes of Rally are the creation of teams and communities, and the education and empowerment of conservation leaders who become poised to solve larger systemic challenges specific to the land conservation community. Rally⿿s impact extends beyond the participants alone, as they become ambassadors who bring the knowledge and skills they learn to their communities. The Land Trust Alliance⿿s overall objectives for Rally 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 our dedicated community of land conservationists. Rally is a core component of achieving the Land Trust Alliance⿿s three strategic goals to increase the pace, to improve the quality and to ensure the permanence of land conservation. To fulfill these goals, we have trained over 10,000 individuals between 2011⿐2016 and 700 land trusts each year. We will evaluate the success of the 2016 Rally and its participation by the following: -Participation⿿goal of at least 1,500 registrants plus other attendees and guests -Diversity of attendees⿿50 states/territories/countries and 300 organizations represented, 10 percent of attendees board members -Scholarships awarded⿿80 scholarships -Total number of first time participants⿿20 percent of total attendees -Evaluation results from workshops, seminars, field trips⿿overall ratings on 1⿐5 scale are tracked; target is 90 percent of the individual workshops and seminars with a core of 4 or higher; key indicator is 98 percent would recommend Rally to a peer -Feedback from participants. Rally inspires its attendees, leaving them with new ideas and action plans. The results of Rally are best described through the firsthand feedback and voices of Rally attendees. A sampling is included on the following page. With lands critical to the health of our nation at threat, what we do today to strengthen the effectiveness of the land trust movement across the country will help determine the natural legacy we leave to future generations. Never has there been a more urgent time to act.