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About The Trust

In the early 1990’s, the Greene County Soil & Water Conservation District (GCSWCD) recognized the need for a land trust type organization that could assist the GCSWCD and its many partners with a wide range of natural resource projects. The GCSWCD was frequently approached by property owners seeking to protect their property, and there were limited options for the landowners. While regional land trusts such as Scenic Hudson and the Open Space Institute were beginning to operate n Greene County, there was no organization that could focus on more local issues and interests.

The idea of forming a local non-profit organization laid dormant until 2003 when the GCSWCD entered into a partnership with the Greene County Industrial Development Agency (GCIDA) to assist with economic development activities. During environmental impact assessments of the GCIDA’s Greene Business & Technology Park project, local, state and federal conservation/environmental interests raised the issue of impacts to the habitats of several bird species of concern, primarily the Northern Harrier hawk.

The GCSWCD and GCIDA developed an aggressive conservation plan which resulted in the development of a Grassland Habitat Protection Plan. The plan was developed jointly by the two agencies and a local Habitat Advisory Committee, and provided for the permanent protection of over 300 acres of fields, forests and riparian wetlands for habitat. The GHPP was approved as a component of the GCIDA’s state and federal wetland permits during development of the Greene Business and Technology Park in the Town of Coxsackie.

Recognizing the need for an organizational structure that would insure long term protection and management of the habitat lands, the GCSWCD and GCIDA funded the establishment of the Upper Hudson—Northern Catskill Natural Resource Trust, which then filed with the NYS Dept of State to operate under the assumed name of Greene Land Trust. While the GLT was founded to assist the habitat protection efforts, it is an autonomous organization that continues to grow and address a range of local natural resource issues in the Greene County area.