URBAN CONSERVATION ASSESSMENT OBSERVATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS FOR ACTION
This report shares suggestions for action at the individual, organizational, and community and systemic levels to support urban conservation efforts in Michigan. With funding from the C.S. Mott Foundation, Heart of the Lakes and Western Reserve Land Conservancy spearheaded an exploration process regarding urban conservation in Michigan and hired Parallel Solutions to guide the process, conduct engagement and assessment activities, and develop this report This report synthesizes observations and themes from one on one interviews and facilitated small group stakeholder conversations with those working on conservation efforts in urban and rural areas across Michigan These listening and dialogue sessions took place in the spring and summer of 2022 and were focused on understanding the values, interests, roles, mindsets, policies and legislation, financial resources, skills and expertise, infrastructure assets, and dedicated time available and required to address urban conservation needs. The observations and suggestions for action in this report address the beliefs, approaches, resources, services, and programs needed to build the capacity for urban conservation work in Michigan.
NOTES ON THE PROCESS
Throughout this process, people shared their thoughts openly. As small group conversations continued over several sessions, new ideas and questions emerged. Sometimes, discussions revealed underlying tensions related to systemic and institutionalized racism. Additionally, some individuals expressed conflicting values, desires, and ideas related to their own motivations, roles, and hopes. These candid conversations and contradictions are an indicator of the complexity around opportunities related to urban conservation. This tension is also evidence of a growth and change process. Creating and having the space to hold this tension is a positive outcome of the exploration process that cannot be easily quantified.
KEY OBSERVATIONS
• There are immediate and significant opportunities in Michigan to improve, restore, manage, and, if possible, permanently protect environmental conditions for people who live in urbanized areas, particularly in areas of historic disinvestment.
• Land conservancies (also called land trusts) in Michigan have extraordinary networks, access to power, access to funding, and significant technical skills and competencies related to conservation, yet only a few apply these resources in urban areas. The land conservancy movement within Michigan and nationally continues to focus on the protection of relatively large tracts of land in undeveloped areas, and it appears there is a sustained desire by many to continue to choose this area of focus.
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
• Urban conservation is happening in Michigan. This work is being led by nonprofit conservation organizations, Friends groups, neighborhood associations, local governments, and a few land trusts working in communities across Michigan. Permanent land protection achieved via fee simple property acquisition or a conservation easement held by a land trust is not often the focus or primary activity associated with these conservation efforts, but these tools could be added to the suite of resources these groups are using, as needed
• Individual donors and foundation funders have a rich history of supporting significant land protection, stewardship, and restoration efforts in rural and exurban areas in Michigan and across the Great Lakes region. A significant amount of this earned wealth has been made within urban areas. There is an opportunity to direct more private financial resources into cities.
WHAT IS URBAN CONSERVATION?
Urban conservation means different things to different people. Through this process, people shared their perspectives and stories about what urban conservation looks like to them. From their lenses, urban conservation activities include:
• Creating and managing urban farms and farming operations such as apiaries.
• Developing and maintaining green infrastructure, such as large scale bioswales and green roofs.
• Developing and managing rain gardens
• Protecting and stewarding parks and green spaces
• Operating a nature center in a city
• Creating and maintaining land and water based trails and greenways
• Restoring and stabilizing wetlands, streams, and rivers
• Tree planting and urban forestry.
• Restoring and revitalizing a city owned park
• Acquiring land for use as a public park, nature preserve, or passive recreation area
• Temporarily or permanently protecting the conservation values and use of a parcel (while restricting other land uses) through deeds, conservation easements, or by fee simple ownership by a land trust.
WHAT DOES “URBAN” MEAN?
People participating in this process had different definitions regarding what constituted an urban place. Some people spoke about urban conservation as efforts that fell within the municipal boundaries of a city, or within the urbanized boundary of a metropolitan area per the Census. Others shared broader perspectives of what an urban space was to them, including suburban and developed areas located outside of cities.
Some interviewees shared a perspective that if you live in a largely rural area, urban may relate more to amenities like the presence of a hospital, or a developed area where there is sewer and water
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022 Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
infrastructure. One interviewee quipped: “If a community is large enough to have a Lebanese restaurant, even if it is a food truck, then it can be considered urban.”
In small group sessions, one participant asked whether “urban” was a code for referring to Black people.
There were small group conversations regarding what type of “identity” urban conservation does or will adopt, as well as who defines the identity and language used, and what actions will be taken and by whom.
There was not a uniform definition or agreement regarding what “urban conservation” constituted However, a working definition that emerged through this process was, “Urban conservation involves improving and restoring, and in some cases preserving, environmental conditions in cities and densely populated areas.”
MOTIVATIONS AND ROLES
There are a variety of roles different entities and individuals play related to conservation. Those interviewed and invited to participate in small group discussions represented land trusts, other conservation focused nonprofit organizations, private foundations, county land banks, and state and local units of government. Some of the roles people described related to their conservation work included:
• Technical or Tactical roles like:
o Scientist (botanist, forester, hydrologist, biologist, etc.)
o Engineer
o Real estate advisor
o Attorney
o Park/public space designer or landscape architect
o Property maintenance or stewardship manager
o Construction or crew supervisor
o Field or crew laborer
o Fiduciary or financial manager
• Relationship and Community Building roles like:
o Educator
o Advocate or champion
o Community or neighborhood organizer
o Visionary
o Strategist
o Diplomat
o Networker
o Fundraiser
o Philanthropist or funder
o Healer
o Facilitator
o Event or volunteer coordinator
o Policy maker
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022 Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
Some people self reported working in urban areas, and some were not currently working in urban areas.
Some not currently working on urban conservation expressed a desire to begin.
• “For me, conservation has been stilted by a Western experience. I’m interested in working on conservation in small pockets, in yard space in cities.”
• “I work for a start up and am new to urban conservation.”
• “I’ve been doing rural conservation and am excited about doing some urban conservation.”
• “Our County’s Land Bank has 15,000 properties and 70% of them are vacant. We have an “adopt a lot” program and are planning to use ARPA funding to demolition some more sites. We are working with 67 different community groups to do things with this vacant land, including Clean and Green groups maintaining properties, but we are not connected yet to the conservation world.”
• “I want to connect with neighborhoods to learn what urban conservation means to those communities. How do we do this? How do we start the conversation?”
Some shared that beliefs, motivations, and mindsets did not always support urban conservation efforts.
• “The goals and frame we use for conservation prioritizes larger parcels of land.”
• “Nature doesn’t come up in community conversations in (my city).”
Those who are working on urban conservation who want to continue also shared their beliefs and motivations.
• “We think about our work in terms of quality of life: clean water, healthy habitats, and recreational opportunities. We apply these same criteria in urban and rural places. Being in this (conservation) work for a while, we go in thinking about how we can create lasting results. We look for projects where there are local community leaders who value and appreciate conservation, and where there is openness to learning more about positive impacts.”
• “We think about the city and the people who live there, and the quality of nature there, and are motivated to protect or restore nature by removing toxins from the soil or water, leaving nature spaces alone, or revitalizing natural systems in order to protect air or water quality.”
• “We need to plan cities with regard for green spaces. We need to have a practice of looking at things in relation to nature. What we often call urban “revitalization” is often devastating to the land and water. My concept of water as a Native woman and as someone who works as an attorney, as a Tribal judge, and as an advocate is that all systems are connected. We look at our rivers and streams as veins of Mother Earth. We need to protect these systems just as we need to protect our own bodies. It is all integrated.”
• “We want to support communities with their Capital Improvement Plans, including stormwater and road/stream crossings. These projects can also be connected to access to nature and recreation…We worked on one project like this it was a storm drain that went into an outlet pipe that went to a Trout Stream.”
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
• “We are working with indigenous teachers to help inspire healing and action related to people’s relationship with water. We want to encourage an adoption of a mindset of reconnection with water, which has its own spirit and rights.”
• “As land trusts, we need to marry our objectives with communities urgent and real on the ground needs.”
• “What we were doing to manage vacant lots wasn’t working. The system of management was all complaint based.”
• “When I first came into the land trust community, I was surprised by the attitude about urban conservation. What surprised me was the attitude that land conservation isn’t about people. There was this attitude that if you focus too much on what people want, you’ll just be developing parks. I think environmental justice should be part of our purpose. It’s part of our strategy now. The objective is to get the land in shape so plants, animals, air water, and people are healthy.”
• “I work on urban conservation efforts because all people deserve time in nature.”
There was an awareness shared by some that strategic shifts and a commitment to align words and actions and investments takes time, and that even in places where urban conservation is occurring on the ground right now, those visible actions took five to seven years to build to fruition.
There were observations shared by participants that urban conservation can feel like a slow process, and action may happen at a slower pace than some might like. A few participants cautioned against a temptation to resist reality by focusing on short term projects and “short cuts” without addressing systemic needs.
Most land trusts in Michigan are not working on conservation efforts in urban areas. Having the motivation and passion to act was mentioned as a critical ingredient. One participant shared that land trusts have a history of working on complicated and complex land deals in rural areas that often take years to complete. They observed that the process and patience required was similar for urban conservation efforts, but with different partners, relationships, and conditions. Land trusts have a culture and practice of being bold and successful when it comes to protecting significant natural lands in rural and low population density areas, even when financial sources are unknown or unsecured at the onset of a land protection project. The barriers to land trusts working on urban conservation projects appear to relate to culture, values, habits, and motivation in addition to resource and capacity obstacles.
WHAT IS WORKING
1. Prioritizing urban conservation projects through collaborative, community-rooted, and neighborhood led processes.
• The efforts of urban conservancies such as Belle Isle Conservancy and the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy.
• Examples of urban conservation efforts led by largely being led by local nonprofit conservation groups that are not land trusts, Friends of Parks groups, neighborhood and redevelopment organizations and associations, and local units of government and the State of Michigan in coordination with nonprofit and local community stakeholders.
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
o Examples shared included projects in the City of Saginaw, Grosse Isle, Ella Fitzgerald Park, Belle Isle, John Lewis Greenway, and projects identified by the Detroit River Public Advisory Council for the Area of Concern, such as the Stoney Island habitat restoration project.
o “Investments in these places reflect a shared community value and desire and encourage a desire to discover and create more.”
• Prioritizing relationship building.
o “Everything comes down to trust.”
2. Collaborating across public and private sectors, and with new entities, and trying new approaches.
• Some participants talked specifically about the positive outcomes of collaborative efforts between County Land Banks and neighborhood and conservation groups
o “As a County Land Bank, we didn’t know land conservancies worked in urban spaces. The other options we tried for management did not work. We started with a pilot for pollinators and property management, and now they (land conservancy) have done 400 lots for us. We like what they’ve done to clean up parcels, and the way they work within communities and with volunteers.”
o “(As a land conservancy) we had a backbone and a foundation for our work, so we weren’t begging for operations funding. A few folks believed in us early on a few projects, then the County Land Bank stepped in. It was about taking a chance… A lot of land trusts operate on constrained resources…I may have a higher risk tolerance…also don’t see what people are afraid of. If you try it and it fails, then you can try something else.”
• Participants shared their awareness of the outcomes of urban conservation, including protecting and restoring habitat, addressing flooding, protecting drinking water sources, creating green space and parks and park programming for people that support physical and mental health and wellbeing, and reducing community violence. They shared that evidence based approaches to urban conservation could help address a variety of community needs.
o “We want to build a more significant regional fee for service program around green infrastructure. And we are working together with partners to understand demand, the niche available, and sustainable service and funding model. We’ve talked about audience and impact. Our business model is under development.”
o “We see the connections between water quality and quality of life…We are trying to “translate” our rural community based planning model to urban; we did this recently in Ypsilanti. They were able to name what they wanted to keep, and we were able to have conversations about lack of access (to nature) in urban spaces.”
3. Investing in priority projects.
• Participants highlighted examples of efforts that had been accomplished, needed sustaining support, and/or were planned and in the pipeline for implementation in Saginaw, Lansing, Flint, Pontiac, Detroit, Plymouth, Kalamazoo, and Alpena.
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
4. Policy approaches that center equity in conservation efforts.
• One participant shared an example of the Water, Climate and Resilience Caucus overseen by Policy Link. This coordinated policy review and advocacy effort impacted the federal water infrastructure bill and resulted in investments that served People of Color and people with lower incomes.
• Several participants discussed the way the Michigan Natural Resources Trust Fund and other state grants’ scoring criteria incentivized or disincentivized certain types of land conservation and expressed curiosity about the State’s goals and investment priorities tied to scoring criteria.
OBSTACLES AND BARRIERS
1. Personal beliefs, mindsets, and motivations.
• “There’s a long held belief within the land trust community that nature and people are separate, and that people are not the priority for conservation efforts.”
• “We need to address the tension between conservation for ecological purposes and community and not think of them as separate or as either/or.”
• “We need to get away from thinking about saving the “last great places” and focus on people living in places, and their relationship with nature.”
• “We need to integrate equity into conservation.”
• “How people experience their environment is specific to place. Conservation cannot be prescriptive.”
• “The language and approach some conservation groups use to describe what conservation is and why it matters doesn’t always resonate with a local community. Land conservation may not matter to people, but environmental conditions may. We need to understand community needs and values first, then invite a conversation about why conservation matters to them.”
• “Nature is not just for naturalists. We need to think more about inclusion, access, and equity, including the distances most people live from nature.”
• “We have to acknowledge the role of systemic racism in the land conservation movement.”
• “Land trusts are transactional. It’s part of their culture.”
• “We know we need to change our culture. But cultural change is hard and may be uncomfortable for some.”
• “We need to have humility. We need to keep learning and trying.”
• “When something doesn’t work, talk about why. You don’t have to throw out a whole concept because a tactic or activity failed. Keep talking though challenges.”
2. Organizational and entity capacity limitations.
• “Our board is not educated and is not aware of urban conservation opportunities.”
• “We don’t have the staff capacity to respond to needs and demands.”
• “We want to do this, but do not know where or how to start.”
Conservation Assessment August 2022
Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
• “We are challenged (as a County) to keep the parks we have and steward them. We lack the resources we need.”
• “During Emergency Management, we lost our parks and maintenance staff. Our Friends group has been backfilling the role of government services, everything from one the ground maintenance to providing funding.”
• “We have realized that we need to have a community outreach and relationship building strategy as part of every project. With one project we were working on, there was an impacted landowner who said they literally wanted to shoot everyone who was involved…Engaging with the community early on lets us know the level of support for an effort and can help us decide when we need to pause or delay a project to learn more about community needs and perspectives or gain more buy in.”
• “This stuff does not happen overnight.”
• “Our publicly owned parks are vulnerable. The land is at risk of being sold.”
• “As a County Land Bank, we don’t have the capacity to manage the size of our inventory. We pay the City to maintain some of our lots, but they can’t find people to hire.”
• “Genesee Land Bank is doing things we wish we could do in Saginaw…we don’t have the same market or capacity.”
• “Finding community partners who are willing to sustain the work over the long term.”
• “We don’t always have the capacity to package an RFP or make an ask or monitor or manage people who agree to manage Land Bank parcels.”
3. L ack of leadership or awareness among elected officials and community leaders .
• “People just don’t know what we have here.” (Speaking about the Saginaw River)
• “Nature is not part of the conversation when people talk about revitalizing urban places. It’s usually about commercial or housing development.”
• “There is a lack of awareness among policy makers and funders regarding rural needs and issues. The issues and challenges in some of our rural and urban communities are the same, but state and federal programs often draw lines around who benefits from specific programs based on population density.”
• “Michigan communities need to be exposed to more examples of urban conservation efforts from other parts of Michigan and from around the Great Lakes.”
• “There are other townships who are not thinking about green infrastructure, but they are thinking about parks. So, we’re thinking about language to connect these dots and define an “urban conservation agenda.”
• “Washtenaw redid their stormwater standards and created better enabling conditions. Wayne, Livingston, and Oakland did not do the same. The barriers are on the political will side. In Wayne, they are listening to developers who do not want additional costs. In Livingston, they tend to be anti legislation.”
4. S ystemic and project - based p atterns of public and private i nvestments .
• “We need stronger grant criteria that focus on the physical and mental health benefits of urban conservation.”
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
• “We need government to invest in the process of community engagement and project prioritization, not just projects. We need them to fund the art and the science.”
• “We need support for staff capacity to build relationships, not just do conservation deals.”
• “Food is evidence of care. There are people working on urban farms in Detroit. If we believe healthy food creates healthy minds, why doesn’t the FDA or USDA make different decisions about how to fund urban agriculture, or provide food for schools?”
• “People who live in Pontiac do not want to drive to Rochester Hills or to a metro park to get out into nature…We need conservation in every community and at different scales and contexts in urban areas to gain both ecological and human benefits.”
• “We mostly fund projects in northern Michigan where there is no shortage of access to nature.”
• “We need to change grant scoring criteria to support disadvantaged communities, regardless of population density or whether they are urban or rural.”
• “What we measure matters. There’s been a historic leaning toward ecological impacts and metrics tied to acres of habitat for birds and water quality preservation, which leads to a bigger bang for your buck in rural areas. We need to think more about using metrics tied to equity and environmental justice.”
• “Our efforts were dependent on support from elected officials. The County Treasurer was an advocate, but she resigned her position, and the new guy doesn’t know who we are…There are no clear pathways for this kind of work. We got a federal grant from the EPA for environmental justice work focused on education, outreach, and engagement. It’s great but not consistent, so it’s hard to systemically engage community. There’s no central funding source for vacant land restoration but there are resources for pollination, junk removal, tree planting…and there’s a risk in chasing funding.
• “Funding eligibility is an issue. Sometimes nonprofits are not eligible, but government is. But the government doesn’t have the capacity or motivation to do the work.”
• “I worry about donor fatigue. And volunteer fatigue. Folks are tired from the pandemic.”
• “We need policy change to do things at scale.”
5. Systemic lack of equity and justice.
Participants in interviews and small groups discussed the impacts of systemic racism and institutionalized public and private sector disinvestment in urban places, including where Black and Indigenous people and People of Color have been living.
• “There is demonstrated disparity (in State data and reports) in both the amount and quality of recreation experiences in urban and rural areas around the state…We have regionally specific data, including by race.”
• “Polluted spaces are disproportionately impacting people of color, children of color.”
• “A lot of places that receive investments get gentrified.”
• “We have communities in our state who still do not have clean drinking water.”
• “There is a generation of kids in Flint who have grown up feeling afraid their water will kill them.”
• “If we keep doing what we are doing, we will keep serving a white demographic.”
• “We have wealthy white people putting trails through other people’s neighborhoods…we need more holistic, neighborhood rooted conversations within communities of color.”
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
Some participants mentioned that the process of applying for competitive grant funding inherently placed communities who lacked historic investments at a higher risk of further disinvestment. Without staff to develop a recreation and parks plan, or to write or administer conservation grants or programs these communities missed out on grant opportunities that others with this capacity could leverage.
Some participants observed that the priority national policy the land trust community advocates for tax benefits for permanent conservation easements is not relevant for most urban communities
Some people shared anger and frustration regarding a lack of accountability for destructive actions
• “People see trees being clear cut by private companies, or they hear about river pollution, and they want to know why it’s happening and why those companies are not held responsible for the impacts on our air and water.”
• “As a practitioner in an urban watershed, there’s nothing more disheartening than to see headwaters developed and destroyed.”
• “We are fighting uphill, walking up a sand dune.”
• “Success is not developed land.”
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
OPPORTUNITIES FOR ACTION
The opportunities for action offered for consideration in this report are organized at the individual, organizational, and community and systems levels. Activities at the individual level may be implemented at any time there is a personal inclination and where resources are available. Activities at the organizational and community and systems levels may be ongoing, and/or initiated within 6, 12, and 24 month timeframes.
INDIVIDUAL LEVEL
People may choose to stay curious, seek education and learn about urban conservation, join conversations, and evaluate their personal frames and theories of change related to conservation Individuals may choose to ask themselves: What stories do I tell myself about urban conservation? What are my personal values related to urban conservation? What do I believe to be true and why? What do I think the conservation movement is and what should it aspire to be? What role may I serve?
Actions that may support and advance urban conservation at the individual level:
• Considering personal values, mindset, and beliefs.
• Offering access or taking advantage of professional coaching.
• Hosting or participating in peer to peer discussions
• Supporting and participating in learning opportunities
• Supporting and participating in mentorship programs.
• Practicing patience within a process that is rooted in relationship building and trust.
• Learning how and acting as an authentic and trusted ambassador for urban conservation.
O RGANIZATIONAL LEVEL
Within public and private sector entities there are opportunities for change relative to values and culture, strategy development and prioritization of projects and resource allocation, board composition, and staff composition and competencies
Actions that may support and advance urban conservation at the organizational level:
• Recognizing the needs, work, expertise, and resources within urban communities, as opposed to having historically White dominated and rural conservation organizations coming in and telling other communities how to do conservation. (ongoing)
• Being and staying willing to adapt to what the different communities and neighborhoods need. (ongoing)
• Supporting the development of strategic plans that include long term goals, actions, and investments for urban conservation (6 24 months)
• Providing resources for board training and board recruitment that focus on diversity and inclusion. (6 24 months)
Conservation Assessment August 2022
Heart
the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S.
• Helping organizations assess their staffing mix and hiring practices, including related to skills and competencies and relative to diversity. (6 24 months)
• Creating programs that “bundle” conservation efforts and neighborhood or corridor focused activities and properties within urban communities. Incentivizing this type of packaging. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting efforts to build sustainable funding sources, including endowments, so that multi year relationship building and community building needs are not dependent on project based grants (24 months/ongoing)
• Building the capacity of community and neighborhood groups who may not historically have had the institutional capacity to apply for state and federal grants gain access to these opportunities. (6 24 months/ongoing)
COMMUNITY AND SYSTEMS LEVEL
Actions that may support and advance urban conservation at a community and systems level:
• Understanding and documenting systemic and historical barriers and obstacles related to urban conservation, as well as outcomes and impacts. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Incentivizing ways to embed and amplify urban conservation planning within existing public master planning, land use planning, and parks and recreation planning processes. Using public master plans and parks and recreation plans to drive budget processes and project based investments. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Creating stronger and deep streams of public and private funding to implement the action steps identified in public parks and creation plans and community master plans (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Providing financial support and incentives for municipalities who choose to integrate conservation and infrastructure planning efforts. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting effective communication and partnerships between cities and counties. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• More deeply harnessing and using tools such as Land Banks to support urban conservation. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting thinking regionally about priorities including within and across counties by:
o Continuing to support collaborative inter jurisdictional and cross sector networks to identify collective needs and impacts, develop shared goals, and act. (6 24 months/ongoing)
o Using equity and justice lenses to think about regional stormwater management. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting processes that evaluate changes to public grant eligibility and scoring criteria that includes a more equitable and long term lens. (6 24 months)
• Supporting the capacity for entities and communities to leverage both DNR and ARPA funding by supporting integrated and coordinated planning and project prioritization at the community level. (6 12 months)
• Considering ways to offer and deploy more unrestricted funds to guide and stimulate efforts rather than react to specific projects. (6 24 months/ongoing)
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation
• Building the capacity for individuals and organizations to create and nurture authentic relationships that lead to long term support for conservation at the community level. Actively and holistically engaging community members in neighborhood rooted conversations about conservation, parks, and trails. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting processes and projects and taking a long term view of conservation by addressing capacity needs related to planning, land protection and acquisition, and land stewardship, management, and maintenance. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting the education of elected officials. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting policy efforts to conserve land in the public’s interests. (6 24 months/ongoing)
o Creating public policies that won't allow for the sale of parks and conservation properties unless it's voted on by the residents
o Creating publicly regulated Conservation Designations to help protect existing public park properties
• Investing in urban parks to achieve the equity goals outlined within the Department of Natural Resources Land Use Strategy. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting efforts to utilize conservation opportunities as a catalyst for developing green jobs (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Promoting the importance of the outdoors, and health and wellness for people and communities. (6 24 months/ongoing)
• Supporting statewide networks and conversations that lead to action, experimentation, and continual learning about urban conservation opportunities and approaches (6 24 months/ongoing)
POTENTIAL ROLES AND NEXT STEPS
This process revealed several immediate opportunities for action including the potential for:
• A nationally focused entity or entities to pursue federal policy changes and incentives that will result in investments in urban conservation, advocate for and guide financial and non financial resources to urban conservation efforts in Michigan, and collaborate with state and locally focused public, private, and nonprofit entities to leverage resources and impacts.
• A Michigan focused entity or entities to act as process navigators, coaches, facilitators, trainers, and/or resource flow advisors for entities desiring to work on urban conservation efforts This could include hosting learning opportunities, facilitating relationships among and between entities, walking alongside partners as advisors and guides, and/or coaching conservation and neighborhood based organizations that are not land trusts to help build their capacity to use permanent land conservation tools, as needed, to complement their existing efforts
• A locally focused entity or entities to learn from those experienced in urban conservation, seek training and join networks to increase individual and organizational awareness of opportunities and resources, develop and deepen relationships with others who care about urban conservation, increase skills and capacity to participate in urban conservation efforts, champion and support urban conservation efforts, explore new partnerships, and try new approaches.
• Those with resources to make investments in envisioned and planned urban conservation efforts in Saginaw, Pontiac, Alpena, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Flint, Lansing, Muskegon, and Detroit.
Urban Conservation Assessment August 2022
Prepared for Heart of the Lakes and the Western Reserve Land Conservancy with funding from the C. S. Mott Foundation