SMHT has collected resource materials and web links that provide information for landowners wishing to preserve their land for future generations and other young land trusts like the SMHT.  Feel free to email us if you have questions that are not answered here.  We’ll try our best to help.

Resources for the Landowner

• definitions of common terms (information from and links to the Land Trust Alliance) =>
• our booklet illustrating different ways to preserve land  
• Purchase of Development Rights (PDR) - NY State Department of Agriculture and Markets  =>      
• NYS Farmland Protection Program PDR information (4 pages) 

Strategic Land Protection Plan:  This comprehensive region plan was developed in 2005 for the SMHT by the Cornell University Department of City and Regional Planning under the guidance of Professor Ole M. Amundsen, III. The Strategic Land Protection Plan for the Southern Madison Heritage Trust (SMHT) is a bold vision. The plan is based on demographic research and inventories of both natural and scenic resources. Using these inventories, suitability models in GIS were created to display various land protection scenarios. Taking advantage of the New York State Canal Corporation’s recently announced proposal for an Empire State Greenway building on the historic Erie Canal network, the students crafted a proposed greenway for recreational uses, natural resource functions and growth management. As the Chenango Canal is an integral part of the proposed greenway, the long term protection of this corridor is major concern for SMHT. Within the proposed greenway, the students modeled a greenbelt surrounding the four major municipalities that is designed to allow growth while protecting the gateways to the villages, surrounding farmland and biodiversity of the region. The conservation of the proposed 16,000 acre greenbelt can be achieved through the use of regulatory tools, transfer of lands from key partners to SMHT, improved land management by private landowners as well as the exercise of real estate tools used by SMHT such as securing easements through outright purchase or donation from willing landowners. Download (18 Megabytes)