A Partnership

CREATES A PARK.

dontezChristine Craycroft at the Upper Cuyahoga Bog PreserveAn international freight airport was once proposed for a 504-acre site in rural Portage County. The airport was never built, but the threat of development hovered over the site for years.

 

Today, this high-quality forest and wetlands area, which protects 8,000 linear feet of a tributary to the Upper Cuyahoga River and is home to several endangered species, including the yellow-bellied sapsucker, is about to become the centerpiece of the Portage Park District, thanks to a successful partnership between the park system and the Land Conservancy.

 

The county park district, which has an annual budget of about $200,000 and does not have its own tax levy, did not have the financial capacity to acquire the Shalersville Township property until it joined forces with the Land Conservancy, according to Christine Craycroft, who has been with the park system since 1996 and became its first director in 1998.

 

"We're a tiny district without a levy, so the partnership has been invaluable," Craycroft said. "The Land Conservancy has a full professional staff with the expertise that we just didn't have in house. This is by far the biggest property we have acquired, and we couldn't have done it without them." Craycroft cited many benefits of conserving the property, including protecting drinking water and wildlife habitat.

 

"Now, we‘re looking forward to developing management plans and seeking community support to turn it into a park," she said. "It's a beautiful place, and it will provide value and enjoyment for the public for generations to come."

pie chart acres protected

Ten projects get public funding

The Land Conservancy continues to secure public funding for land-protection projects in northern Ohio. During fiscal year 2009, the Land Conservancy secured funding for 10 projects involving public dollars in the amount of $8,424,566 from eight separate sources.

 

The funding sources include state and federal grants plus local and private dollars linked to public funding projects. Sixty-five percent of the funding (about $5.5 million) came from state programs, while 24 percent (about $2 million) was secured from federal sources.

 

The largest single grants secured in FY2009 were state Water Resource Restoration Sponsor Program awards: $1,785,000 for the Upper Cuyahoga Bog Preserve in Portage County and $1,725,000 for Orchard Hills Park in Geauga and Lake counties.

 

Public funding secured by the Land Conservancy – sometimes in the name of a county or local park district – remains a vital source for new parkland in the Western Reserve.