It has been a busy beginning of the state legislative session! We’ve successfully seen the introduction and progress of the Working Group Bill – SB20-135. On Thursday, Feb. 27, critical amendments were introduced to strike a balance between the landowner compensation coming from future years’ credits and qualifications for those payments. The bill was laid over in the Senate Finance Committee and will be rescheduled for a vote soon.

Keep It Colorado also successfully lobbied against two bills that were not favorable to the conservation community. The first bill involved transmission lines across conservation easements. We are continuing to work with stakeholders and key legislators to more comprehensively address the issues, recognizing the value of staying at the table and working together to meet the state’s energy needs and protect conservation values.

The second bill created redundancies in current law and administrative processes for conservation easement reviews. Through the working group legislation, the outstanding concerns can more comprehensively be addressed. We are continuing to work on technical changes to the conservation easement and credit program proposed in our policy platform, as well as working to include water entities in conservation deals. We hope to have more details and legislation introduced soon.

As part of advocating for our policy platform and building up the coalition, we are strategically supporting partner initiatives as well. Funding for State Parks, securing the future of the Outdoor Recreation Industry Office, and supporting research on back-country search and rescue services are among the initiatives we’ve supported in recent weeks.

We are also working on federal policy and will be traveling to Washington, DC to participate in the Land Trust Alliance’s Advocacy Days at the end of March. We hope to continue gaining support to end the syndication deals happening around the country, end the impacts from State and Local Tax regulations on Colorado landowners, and secure full funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund. If you’re interested in Advocacy Days or would like more information on our federal initiatives, please reach out to Melissa.