Many donors ask, “If you are raising millions for projects, why do you need my money?”

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The vast majority of funding we secure is restricted to project-specific costs and we cannot use it to pay for general staff time. Most project funding goes to landowners in exchange for the specific property rights we buy in order to protect habitat and open space by making sure the property will not be developed.

Our project team estimates that it takes about 1,000 staff hours to complete a single project, regardless of how many acres the project protects. What takes so long?

• Several meetings with landowners over the course of the project

• Site visits to take photos, surveys, or reports

• Writing private grants to multiple funding partners per project

• Working with federal agencies on behalf of the landowner to secure funding

• Negotiating project details with multiple funders

• Hiring and managing experts on geological, legal, and environmental reports

 

Our staff also keeps our organization running with day-to-day tasks, annual fundraising, and constant training to hone their expertise. We are extremely proud of our staff, and we have worked so hard to get here. Our staff are worth every penny we invest in them: over the last two years, our staff have been able to secure 64 times the cost of their own salaries in restricted project funding. This means we can leverage your donations 64:1!