Montezuma Land Conservancy

PART II, LINE 5:

“It is the policy of the organization to provide perpetual stewardship of conservation easements through a monitoring program that involves regular personal contact with the land owner and field examination of property. It is also the policy of the organization to ensure the reasonable quiet enjoyment of the property by the property owners. The organization typically will not perform annual monitoring without arranging the visit for a mutually beneficial date and time. Only when the owner blatantly ignores or avoids requests for an annual monitoring visit will the organization resort to monitoring without an appointment for approval of the land owner. Only trained personnel will perform monitoring, ideally in pairs with a staff member and a volunteer. Highly trained and experienced volunteers may monitor without a staff member only after they have been reviewed and approved by the executive director. The organization's violation procedures are: 1. Any suspected violation is reported to the executive director. 2. The executive director considers the report of suspected violation and documentation gathered by the monitors and carefully reviews the entire conservation easement. If the executive director concurs that there is a possible violation, the executive director consults with the organization's legal counsel about the easement provisions that may have been violated to ensure that the provisions are clear on the issue. 3. If the documentation from the monitoring visit is not totally clear on the issue, the executive director will attempt to schedule a site visit to inspect the situation, explaining to the land owner that the executive director needs to personally see and understand conditions on the land mentioned in the monitoring report. At this visit the executive director will further document the possible violation with camera, video, amps, measurements, field notes, and comparison to baseline documentation and monitoring reports. 4. If the executive director and legal counsel believe that there is a possible violation, the issue is referred to the organization's board of directors at the next regularly scheduled meeting. If the violation entails the potential for continuing or increased damage to the conservation values, it may be submitted to the board for a telephone vote. 5. If the board concludes that there is no violation, the process ends. 6. If the board concludes that there is a violation, the executive director will classify the apparent violation as one of three types: a minor violation; a major violation; an immediate threat. 7. In all cases the executive director shall contact the violator by telephone to explain the situation and request immediate cessation of the violation activity and/or correction of the problem. If the land owner disagrees that there is a violation then the executive director should request a personal meeting. 8. Following the phone call a letter is sent via certified mail to the land owner detailing the violation including a description of the violation including its material impact, location and extent, the applicable easement citation and the proposed land owner actions to correct the violation. 9. If the land owner promptly complies with the requested solution, verify the corrective action and send a thank you letter. 10. No one person should make a decision on violation response without counsel first. 11. The organization will always conduct meetings with the property owner as a team of two.”