Newton Conservators Inc.

“Newton Conservators Policy for Conservation Restriction Monitoring is as follows: 1. Conservation Restrictions (CRs) are monitored by a team of Newton Conservators Directors with assistance from other Conservators members. Monitoring is done on each property at least once a year, usually in the fall. 2. Owners of the properties, including the responsible City agencies, are contacted and invited to accompany the monitors on their site visit. 3. Reports are prepared by the monitoring team and submitted on a form that was voted on and approved by the Board of the Newton Conservators, which includes maps, notes and photos. The form includes all areas that need to be examined for compliance with each CR and includes room for recommendations. All such forms are signed by the monitoring team and kept both in paper and electronic formats. 4. The completed forms are reviewed and edited by a designated Board member and copies sent to the property owners and City agencies along with a list of any problems noted and recommendations for needed work. 5. If any problems with the properties are found during the monitoring visit, follow-up with the owner takes place. If need be, the properties are re inspected. 6. If CR violations continue, the Newton Conservators may resort to legal means to bring a property into compliance with its CR.”

“Newton Conservators holds 9 Conservation Restrictions; 8 of which (85.9 acres) are on city-owned property and did not involve any tax deduction. The largest city parcel is a 75-acre golf course; the others are open spaces acquired by the city with Community Preservation Act funds, which requires the city to grant a conservation restriction to an outside organization. The 9th CR is on a 1.58 acre private property. The CRs do not appear on our financial statements. In addition to the CRs, we also received in prior years 2 gifts of land (0.8 acres in total) for conservation purposes - these properties appear on our Balance Sheet with a value of $1 each. For all the CR properties and owned land, Newton Conservators conducts annual monitoring visits and produces reports, per our CR Monitoring policy.”

“For 2 city-owned properties on which Newton Conservators hold the CR, there are city-funded escrow accounts at a local bank to provide for our costs of monitoring and enforcing the CRs in perpetuity. The escrow accounts appear on the Balance Sheet on Part X line 15 (other assets) - they are the only item on that line. They are offset by an equal amount of liability - shown on Part X line 21.”

“The endowment funds are used to maintain our owned parks (which are open to the public), cover necessary expenses for CR monitoring (for properties without escrows), and to provide for potential acquisition of new open spaces for public benefit.”