Source: Greenville News (September 1, 2022) – The mountains and foothills of northwestern South Carolina are a place of singular beauty and abundant natural resources, causing people to flock here for centuries. That growth has exploded exponentially in recent decades and, if left unchecked, it has the potential to destroy the very things that drew…
Source: Greenville Journal (January 13, 2022) – Hank Didier knows from experience the importance of protecting the environment. As an Orlando attorney who tried cases involving the Takata airbag failures and the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, Didier spent more than 20 years as a successful environmental and consumer product safety…
May 9, 2021 (Source: Wall Street Journal) -Rising stars such as Greenville, S.C., Des Moines, Iowa, and Provo, Utah, built out vibrant economies even before the pandemic; now, they are drawing new workers and businesses The pandemic is accelerating growth in midsize cities, positioning them to lead the charge in the nation’s economic rebound. Even…
Source: The Hill/Robert Ramsay (September 18, 2020) With summer coming to a close, Americans will soon be renewing the traditions of autumn. Fall is my absolute favorite season for outdoor recreation. It is well known that spending time outside provides so many benefits for our health and general well-being while allowing us to respect social…
Last spring, I invited Dr. Patrick McMillan, Hilliard Professor of Environmental Sustainability at Clemson and Director of the SC Botanical Garden, to speak at one of Upstate Forever’s events. He urged us all to take a moment to be awed by our region’s natural wonders, and to appreciate how beautiful — and unusual — the…
Tax write-offs and cash payments normally reimburse owners with only a fraction of the value given up and the costs incurred by landowners who choose to protect their lands by placing conservation easements on them.
Source: The Hill (April 11, 2018) – A healthy environment plays a central role in ensuring the well-being of our country and our communities. That’s why protecting it for future generations is so important. Of the many ways we can safeguard our environment, land conservation has served as an especially important tool in preserving open spaces,…
Last week in Bartow I sat through an entire day of presentations by Florida farmers and ranchers looking to sell a conservation easement (essentially, the development rights) to the state through the Rural and Family Lands Program, one of the primary land conservation programs in our state. Speaker after speaker — several moved to tears…
Our environment plays an essential role in providing a high quality of life for our country, our communities and our children. That’s why protecting it is so important. There are countless ways everyone can contribute to this mission but in recent years, land conservation has been a distinctly valuable tool for preserving the health of…
Considered by many as a founding father of wildlife ecology and land preservation, Aldo Leopold believed “conservation will ultimately boil down to rewarding the private landowner who conserves in the public interest.” The conservation movement he helped inspire is now debating the appropriateness of those rewards when the land is owned by a real-estate partnership. I labor on the front lines of this debate as the head…