Protecting Ecological Resources at Acadia National Park through Landscape Scale Conservation and Easement Planning

Guntenspergen, Glenn; Neckles, Hilary

Report concerning a project to Protect the Ecological Resources found at Acadia Natinal Park. Acadia National Park (ANP) consists of a widely dispersed set of parcels in and adjacent to the Gulf of Maine. Park lands are found on Mt Desert Island, the Schoodic Peninsula, and offshore islands in Knox and Hancock County, Maine and are interspersed by private and other public lands. Because of the interspersion of private landholdings with Park property and the potential for increased development, the Park faces major challenges in the preservation and protection of its biological and ecological resources. Development on lands adjacent to the Park continues to intensify and an offshore aquaculture industry and water quality issues have raised concerns about the impacts on the Park's natural resources. Many of these adjacent non-Park parcels and islands are critically important to the integrity of wildlife populations, ecosystem health, and other natural resources within Park boundaries. The Park has a legislatively authorized conservation easement program that has been used to provide additional protection to critically important private lands (Section 102 (h) of PL 99-420). The 1986 Acadia Park Boundary legislation outlined Acadia NP authority, responsibilities, and guidelines for developing conservation easements. However, the Park has only used broad and general criteria for evaluating conservation easements on adjacent land. These criteria included: the benefit for resource protection and proximity of the easement to the Boundary of the Park and other easements. Increasingly, the Park has recognized that it needs to use a more scientifically based set of criteria that recognizes the broader landscape setting to evaluate potential additions to the easement program. We propose to develop and provide a more scientifically based landscape scale assessment of adjacent non-Park parcels and Park properties that will identify critically important candidates for the Park to consider in their conservation easement program.