Welcome to the second week of the Our Common Agenda Education Series, featuring the Natural Landscapes & Supporting Infrastructure chapter of Our Common Agenda. Read below for the latest on Virginia’s conservation funding needs, tree canopy preservation efforts, and regenerative farming development. While you’re at it, make sure to check out our other weeks of education here.

Virginian’s identities and quality of life are rooted in our land. We take pride in our stunning and iconic landscapes: the rugged Appalachian Mountains, fertile Piedmont, tidal rivers flowing across the coastal plain to the Chesapeake Bay. These much-loved open spaces did not happen by accident. They are a direct result of public investment in land protection.

Virginia needs to establish dedicated funding for our natural resources, which will support our local economies; form the foundation of our culture and diverse communities; and sustain the health of our people, our wildlife, and our water.

According to newly-released survey, Virginians overwhelming support increased investments in conservation efforts to protect land, water, and wildlife. The study revealed that more than three-quarters of Virginia voters, throughout the state and across party lines, are supportive of the General Assembly dedicating $300 million annually in conservation projects to protect Virginia’s natural resources. VCN and our partners will continue to advocate for increased conservation funding by lobbying for the policy recommendations below.

• Land Preservation Tax Credit (LPTC): No changes should be made to the LPTC, a proven and effective land conservation tool Virginia’s Land Conservation Grant Programs
• Virginia Land Conservation Foundation: $40 million for the Virginia Land Conservation Foundation, $5 million for the Virginia Farmland Preservation Fund, and $5 million for the Virginia Battlefield Preservation Fund
• New Outdoor Recreation Community Access Fund: $50 million to be administered as a new statewide initiative
• Establish a source of dedicated funding that provides a minimum of $300 million per year to natural resource conservation. This total includes the needs identified in Conserving Virginia’s Landscapes for the Future. The remaining funds would address the identified gaps in Virginia’s conservation programs, both in the scope of work and communities served, as identified throughout Our Common Agenda.
• Direct the Secretary of Natural and Historic Resources to convene a workgroup to study and provide recommendations on how Virginia can increase the proportion of available federal funding for conservation that Virginia is able to capture.

Thank you to our Partners for their continued support of strong conservation funding:

The Nature Conservancy in Virginia, Virginia League of Conservation Voters, The Piedmont Environmental Council, Northern Virginia Conservation Trust, and Alliance for the Shenandoah Valley.

From Chief Powhatan’s capital, Werowocomoco, to Civil War battlefields to Rosenwald schools and sites related to the struggle for Civil Rights, Virginia’s diverse array of historic and cultural resources tell the story of our Commonwealth and nation. Robust support for existing programs as well as exploration of broadening preservation tools available to protect these resources is critically important to ensure their benefit to current and future generations and supports key industries, including agriculture and tourism.

We recognize that certain historic resources preserve the memory of racial injustice, and we support efforts to relocate or recontextualize these resources as appropriate.

• Strengthen the Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credit program to allow for at least a temporary increase in the percentage tax credit that can be claimed to help the state’s economic recovery.
• Allocate $40 million and $5 million for the Virginia Land Conservation Fund and the Virginia Battlefield Preservation Fund, respectively.
• Continue to make adjustments to Virginia Land Conservation Fund which encourage the preservation of sites which highlight Virginia’s culturally diverse history.
• Continue to provide increased funding for the documentation, identification, and protection of African American and Virginia Indian historic resources.

Interested in supporting the intersection of historic & cultural preservation and equity? Then check out the Sovereign Nations of Virginia Conference on September 24, 2021. It will be a great event for those interested in figuring out how best to assist tribes in land acquisition and conservation!

Thank you to our Partners for their advocacy for our cultural & historic resources: The Piedmont Environmental Council, American Battlefield Trust, and Preservation Virginia.

River Steward Planting Trees in Monroe Park, VA. Image credit: Carleigh Starkston

Trees are more than a form of “beautification.” They are a living form of infrastructure, providing services that include stormwater management, air filtering, carbon sequestration, and cooling the environment around them.

Virginia is losing vast tracts of trees, including our urban tree canopy, to development, redevelopment, and disease. This loss reduces the state’s capacity to address climate change, improve community health, and improve air and water quality. Forests and urban trees, first and foremost, need additional protection to preserve what we have left. Increased funding for planting new trees and maintenance of existing trees is also necessary to achieve needed canopy goals.

• Expand on and build stronger protections for existing tree canopy, such as conducting a natural resources inventory as the first step in the site planning process to preserve existing trees.
• Remove “Planning District 8” from Conservation of Trees during Land Development, which would enable all localities to collect fees to supply trees to community based organizations to increase canopy on private property.
• Amend Conservation of Trees during Land Development and Replacement of trees during development process to give localities the authority to establish their tree canopy replacement and conservation goals to address equity in formerly redlined areas, increase flood resiliency, realize local comprehensive plan goals, and meet water quality permit requirements.

Thank you to our Partners at Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Friends of the Rappahannock, and Audubon Naturalist Society for their continued work to protect and restore Virginia’s tree canopy!

Take a deeper dive into the benefits of increased tree canopy by watching the video below about how US cities are mitigating the urban heat island effect with trees.

Agriculture, a driver of rural prosperity, is also a significant climate solution when regenerative practices are applied. Regenerative principles include building soil health and fertility, increasing water percolation and retention, biodiversity, and ecosystem health, and reducing carbon emissions and current atmospheric CO2 levels. Small-scale pasture-based meat production is especially promising. Capturing this potential involves improving the information base to best frame solutions and target interventions, increasing investment in slaughter/processing and farmer capacity building, and framing and implementing policy and programs with an equity lens.

The promotion of regenerative farming can also play a role in reaching racial equity in our agricultural sector. Black-owned farms make up a minuscule 0.4% of acreage nationwide. We will advocate for the policies below to help people of color start farming, relieve farmer’s debt, root out discrimination at USDA, and address past injustices provides the focal point for organizing initiatives at the state level to support farmers of color to launch and to succeed.

Climate-smart agriculture:

• Add specific reference in VACS program guidelines to “climate-smart conservation activities and farming systems that increase organic matter and carbon sequestration in soil and store carbon in biomass” as a category eligible for agriculture cost share.
• Generate new funding of $250,000 for grants under AFID program for small-scale meat slaughter/processing capacity and meat cutter training.
• Create a statewide asset map and gap analysis of slaughter/processing capacity and survey of processing barriers.
• Generate new funding of $1,000,000 for cooperative extension to help farmers implement climate-smart practices.

Support to farmers of color:

• Conduct a census of farmers of color.
• Set-aside 15% of funding in programs for agriculture, extension, land conservation, and water quality for farmers of color.
• Develop an annual report to the General Assembly on agency performance in serving farmers of color.

Thank you to our Partners at the Virginia Association for Biological Farming, Black Family Land Trust, and The Piedmont Environmental Council for spearheading our new policy paper to support a climate-smart and equitable farming system!

Want to learn more about regenerative farming? For your next movie night, check out Kiss the Ground (trailer below), a full-length documentary narrated by Woody Harrelson that sheds light on an “new, old approach” to farming called “regenerative agriculture” that has the potential to balance our climate, replenish our vast water supplies, and feed the world.