TPL Launches Conservation Almanac

WASHINGTON, D.C., 4/21/2008: The first, single, comprehensive online database of land conservation in America was unveiled today by the Trust for Public Land (TPL), a national conservation organization.

The website, www.ConservationAlmanac.org, is the definitive source of information about land conservation at the state and federal level, including acreage protected and dollars spent. TPL created the Conservation Almanac as a direct response to the numerous questions posed by policy makers, members of the media, and conservation leaders about the growing field of land conservation in America. The data has taken five years to collect and will be updated as new information becomes available.

“As we near another Earth Day, finally there is a single resource where these figures are located,” said Ernest Cook, director of TPL’s Conservation Finance program, which developed the Almanac. “Up until now, there have been attempts to capture individual pieces of the picture on land conservation in America, but none have been able to assemble this data as consistently and completely.”

Features of TPL’s Conservation Almanac include:

• Original data from the source – Acres conserved and dollars spent verified by over 100 public agencies.
• Real data, in real time – As new information becomes available, the database will reflect it.
• Easy tools to search and compare – Data is searchable and accessible for customized queries.
• State-by-state descriptions of conservation programs and policies.

The Conservation Almanac also displays in Google map format TPL’s LandVote database, which details the history of ballot measures supporting land conservation across America, dating back to 1994.

The Trust for Public Land is a national nonprofit land conservation organization which conserves land for people to enjoy as parks, gardens and other natural places, ensuring livable communities for generations to come. Since its founding in 1972, TPL has helped protect more than two million acres in 46 states. Visit TPL on the Web at www.tpl.org. The Conservation Almanac was made possible by grants from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Trust.