The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), and Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (Ohio EPA) are working with a local land trust organization to acquire conservation easements within the Paddys Run watershed. Funds for this effort are provided from a Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA) natural-resource damage settlement. DOE and Ohio EPA settled their claim in November 2008. As part of the settlement, DOE paid $13.75 million to compensate for natural resource injury. These settlement funds were appropriated for restoration, replacement, or acquisition of equivalent natural resources at or near the Fernald Preserve.

The Fernald Natural Resource Trustees (DOE, Ohio EPA, and USFWS) agreed to implement a watershed protection program that encompasses the Fernald site. Paddys Run is a stream that flows through the western portion of the preserve. Its watershed encompasses about 16-square miles, including most of the Fernald property (see aerial photo). By protecting the Paddys Run watershed (and therefore the water quality in Paddys Run and the Great Miami Aquifer), the Trustees are meeting their CERCLA obligations. The Paddys Run Conservation Project (PRCP) allows landowners within the watershed or the surrounding area to voluntarily preserve land via conservation easements or sale of property to a land trust organization on behalf of
the Trustees.

The Trustees, through Ohio EPA, contracted with a local land trust—Three Valley Conservation Trust (TVCT). TVCT is a nonprofit organization and an accredited land trust through the Land Trust Alliance. TVCT contributes experience working with local landowners and state agencies to protect property through conservation and agricultural conservation easements. In addition, TVCT has an ongoing partnership with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which is useful when expanding the reach of settlement funds. Conservation easements, or agricultural conservation easements, are the Trustees’ primary tools for implementing watershed protection under the PRCP.

The Fernald settlement funds are eligible to act as matching grant funds for additional federal agency programs. TVCT’s expertise working with the USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service’s Farmland Protection program allows the Trustees to significantly expand the purchasing power of the available funds. TVCT had an agreement with USDA to implement grants from the former Farm and Ranch Land Protection Program. The agreement enabled TVCT to obtain funding from USDA for 50 percent of the properties’ easement value, as long as they met program requirements and provided a 17-percent match for the federal funds. Thus the Trustees could purchase large-farm agricultural conservation easements for 17 percent of the easement value, with USDA providing the largest portion of the funding. The Trustees, through TVCT, are responsible for selecting properties and funding the significant property documentation required for the USDA applicants. USDA reviews and gives final approval of the applicant farms.

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Fernald Preseve, Ohio, Watershed Boundary.

Ohio EPA worked with TVCT to develop property selection criteria for funding conservation easements, based upon the Trustees’ goals to protect the Paddys Run watershed and underlying Great Miami Aquifer. TVCT is responsible for monitoring the easement properties in perpetuity. As part of the Trustee funding, an endowment is established for long-term monitoring and legal support to TVCT to enforce easement terms. TVCT conducts annual easement property inspections to ensure easement terms are followed.

As of January 2016, almost 3,000 acres have been established as conservation easements. An additional 169 acres have been purchased by TVCT. Settlement funds are being used to ecologically restore the purchased properties, with plans to donate the properties to the Metro Parks of Butler County. The project has been a success. The collaboration of the various organizations and open communication with the public are key factors in that success. As a result, the PRCP has surpassed its goals to protect the Paddys Run Watershed and Great Miami Aquifer.