Friends of Stowe Conservation Inc

“Monitoring is the regular and systematic gathering of information about a conserved property to detect changes and to ensure the property is being used in accordance with the legal restrictions placed on it. SLT monitors land that it owns in fee as well as those on which it holds legal rights through a conservation easement or other legal covenant. All SLT conserved properties are monitored at least once annually in person on the ground.Stowe Land Trust is responsible for enforcing all of its conservation easements through identification and rectification of violations. Regular communication with landowners and diligent annual monitoring can result in minimizing violations and help to resolve enforcement issues in a timely manner.”

“The Stowe Land Trust acquires easements and development rights on property through purchase and donation. Within the conservancy movement, a divergence of practice exists as to the values at which easements and development rights are appropriately recorded. The smaller, locally based conservancy organizations tend toward not capitalizing such acquisitions. The Stowe Land Trust has adopted this policy of not capitalizing as assets the acquisition of easements and development rights, but rather discloses them in the footnotes to the financial statements.”

“The endowment funds are held for long-term growth with the intent to generate on-going income or reserves. The goals of the investment policy are to have sufficient cash resources to meet current spending needs and maintain a positive return on assets held for longer term goals.”

“The Land Trust is a not-for-profit organization that is exempt from income taxes under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and classified by the Internal Revenue Service as other than a private foundation. The Land Trust is subject to a tax on income from any unrelated business income.The Land Trust has analyzed tax positions taken on its tax returns and believes that all tax positions will be sustained upon examination and does not anticipate any adjustments that would result in a material adverse affect on the Land Trust's financial condition, results of operations or cash flows. Accordingly, the Land Trust has not recorded any reserves, or related accruals for interest and penalties for uncertain income tax positions at September 30, 2020.”