Over the past 30 years, land conservation efforts of non-profit organizations and community leaders in the Piedmont have helped landowners permanently protect over 152,000 acres of land from development. These protected acres include scenic views, open space, wildlife habitat, and groundwater recharge areas, which together represent one of the highest concentrations of privately owned land under conservation easement in the United States. These conservation efforts help to ensure a sustainable Piedmont and a healthy urban core in the Washington, DC Metropolitan region.

Unfortunately, the threats of development and land conversion also continue to increase, imperiling the scenic views, open space, and forested lands that provide habitat to a multitude of wildlife and drinking water for the area's rural, suburban, and urban communities. Open space lands in the Commonwealth are being converted at an average of 188 acres each day-the equivalent of one Virginia farm replaced daily by development-according to data from the USDA/Natural Resources Conservation Service's Natural Resources Inventory (1997). Countering the destruction of our valuable natural resources is a difficult task, but to date the Piedmont Foundation has helped protected land at a rate that exceeds its conversion to more intensive land uses.

Through the work of the Piedmont Foundation, the number of easements proposed, approved, and recorded will continue to increase over the coming years. One of the most useful tools for continuing land protection efforts in the Piedmont is the development of land conservation funds that help fund local conservation projects. The funds help to narrow regional conservation goals to a local focus, creating momentum among neighbors to increase the donation of conservation easements in communities where the funds operate.

The Piedmont Foundation has used private donations to create six of these land conservation funds. These funds aid in the purchase of at-risk properties and conservation easements, where necessary. With these land conservation funds peppering the Piedmont region, a growing number of partnerships with local governments and private individuals on conservation initiatives will increase the rate at which we protect the region's historic landscapes. Eventually, The Piedmont Foundation hopes to help establish similar funds to aid in conservation efforts in each county within the Northern Piedmont region.

James M. Rowley Goose Creek Conservation Fund - Established as a memorial to James M. Rowley, this Fund helps protect the water quality, scenic beauty, and rural landscape of the Goose Creek watershed. The Goose Creek watershed, which encompasses 385 square miles in Northern Fauquier and much of Loudoun County, provides drinking water to Eastern Loudoun and Fairfax County residents. Recently, the Piedmont Foundation's James Rowley Goose Creek Fund partnered with Loudoun County's new Purchase of Development Rights program to purchase a conservation easement on the Warren properties, a working farm near The Plains. This transaction is a true testimony to the importance of public-private partnerships in land conservation.

Albemarle Land Conservation Fund - Established in 1999, this Fund directs most of its resources to protect priority conservation areas in Albemarle, including the Southwest Mountains Rural Historic District, and watersheds that protect the drinking water for the areas residents.

Bull Run Mountains Fund - The fund focuses specifically on protecting selected properties immediately adjacent to and within the Bull Run Mountains, a beautiful natural area and concentration of pristine wildlife habitat located just to the east of The Plains, Virginia. The Bull Run Mountains Fund completed its first transaction in September 2000. In June 2001, PEC's Bull Run Mountain Fund completed the purchase of a conservation easement on the historic Fox Den Farm and Mountain Home Farm, which together form one of the last remaining dairy operations in Northern Fauquier County. The farms are owned by the Elgin Family, which has been farming the land since the late 1700s. The property is important to the Bull Run Mountains conservation area and surrounded by other land protected by conservation easements held by the Virginia Outdoors Foundation. Over 90% of the property has prime agricultural soils, and Hungry Run and its tributaries flow throughout the property.

Orange County Land Conservation Fund - The fund was established by the generous donation of an Orange County resident. The fund will help protect Orange County's farms, natural resources and historic lands.

Fauquier Land Conservation Fund - In 2000, the Piedmont Foundation was able to orchestrate the purchase and protection of Ovoka Farmlands. Located on 1,235 acres near Paris, Virginia, the unrivaled view from Ovoka and neighboring Ashby Gap is one of the most popular and painted scenes in Virginia, named by Scenic America in 1999 as on of our nation's Last Chance Landscapes. The proceeds from Ovoka farmlands will establish a land conservation fund in Northern Fauquier County, enabling residents to add to nearly 50,000 acres in the County that are already permanently protected from development by conservation easements.

Cedar Run - The Cedar Run Land Conservation Fund was established as a memorial to Mr. Julian W. Scheer, a lifelong conservationist working in Virginia's Piedmont region. The Cedar Run fund will preserve and protect the land that Mr. Scheer recognized as one of the most beautiful landscapes in the nation.
For more information on any of The Piedmont Foundation's Land Conservation Funds, or to make a donation, please contact Heather Richards at 540.347.2334 ext. 23.

More on Ovoka:
Ovoka's historic context and prime location made it simultaneously a coveted spot for development and a place that held numerous opportunities for strong partnerships in protection efforts. The land is bordered by Sky Meadows State Park, originally donated by conservationist Paul Mellon in 1975 for Park Service use. To the west, Ovoka farmlands stretch across the Fauquier-Clarke county line at the crest of the Blue Ridge, meeting with the Appalachian Trail and other National Park Service land. On the north, the land runs adjacent to historic Route 50 as it crosses the Blue Ridge Mountains, a road surveyed by George Washington himself that has served as an important westward travel route since colonial times. Ashby Gap was the site of important Civil War troop movements, and many believe that Stonewall Jackson himself spent the night in a grove of trees on the Ovoka farmlands tract.

For over 50 years, Mr. Phillip Thomas and his father, Reed Thomas, amassed over 1,600 acres of farmland at Ovoka. Panoramic views from the crest of the Blue Ridge include much of the land in the Piedmont Foxhounds hunting territory, the Bull Run Mountains, the Loudoun Valley, the Orange County Hunt, and the Shenandoah Valley. In order to protect this land, which has special meaning to his family, Mr. Thomas turned down several offers to purchase the land for development before connecting with the Piedmont Foundation.

Under the Foundation's leadership, Ovoka farmlands has been permanently protected through a public-private partnership that includes Mr. Thomas, who agreed to the sale of 1,235 acres at a bargain cost, supportive public politicians Senator John Warner (R, VA) and Congressman Frank Wolf (R, VA), who sponsored a $1.2 million appropriation to purchase buffer areas for the Appalachian Trail, and several special members and donors to the Piedmont Foundation who funded part of the purchase of Ovoka farmlands through a number of grants and loans. For this help, the Piedmont Foundation is very grateful.