Since last year, staff members at the Land Trust of Virginia have fielded phone call after phone call from landowners seeking to set aside their property for conservation.
“We’re getting calls like crazy,” said Sally Price, executive director of the nonprofit, which works with private landowners to preserve farms and natural landscapes. “We’re doubling our staff for easement intake because we’re getting so many calls.”
The land trust expects to complete as many as 30 conservation easements this year, double the number it sees in a typical year, and it’s recorded a fourfold increase in inquiries.
