Estes Valley Land Trust

“"ce stewardship monitoring policy- and "easement enforcement policy": these policies state that all of our easements are monitored at least once annually and all monitoring reports are reviewed and signed by the executive director. Any violations that are identified by monitors are reported directly to the executive director within 72 hours, and a follow- up visit will be scheduled to confirm any threats to conservation values. The executive director contacts the board's stewardship and legal committee immediately if conservation values are in jeopardy, or within 30 days if the issue is not urgent, and the committee will discuss the violation and identify an appropriate response. Evlt will then follow steps to evaluate and document the severity of the violation and file an official violation report in evlt's records. The executive director will then work with the committee to respond to the landowner with recommendations for corrective action and a timeline for compliance. If an agreement is reached with the landowner, the executive director and committee will inspect the site and communicate with the landowner to ensure that the violation has been remedied. Evlt will then document the initial report, any communications with the landowner, the resolution, and any other applicable information in evlt's records. If no agreement is reached with the landowner, evlt will seek outside counsel to help negotiate, engage in dispute resolution, or pursue litigation if necessary.”

“Revenues--donations where the donor has restricted the use of funds to land acquisition are shown as donor restricted contributions. Expenses--direct expenses of monitoring and enforcement and a share of indirect operating costs are shown as program expenses. Balance sheet--quasi-endowment funds are established with donor funds and board-allocated funds. The income and principal of these quasi-endowment funds are used for monitoring and enforcement costs now and in the future. The donation of conservation easements to estes valley land trust has a conservation value, but not an economic value to the organization. Therefore, donated easements are not recorded as support or assets of estes valley land trust. Costs to put easements in place are expensed as they occur.”

“Perpetuity fund (1,407,581)--provides funding for future operating costs of the organization in perpetuity. Stewardship and defense fund (1,353,836)--provides funding for future costs of monitoring and enforcing easements in perpetuity.”

“The organization has adopted the recognition requirements for uncertainty in income taxes as required by the financial accounting standards board accounting standards codification 740-10. The standard prescribes a comprehensive model for how an organization should recognize, measure, present and disclose in the financial statements uncertainty in income taxes the organization has taken or expects to take on a tax return. The organization's income tax filings are subject to audit by various taxing authorities. No provisions for income taxes have been made in the financial statements, as the organization has qualified as non-profit organization exempt from income taxes under section 501(c)(3) of the internal revenue code, and has not received any unrelated business income during 2024. The organization believes that it has appropriate support for any uncertainty in income taxes, and as such, does not believe it has any uncertainty in income taxes that are material to the financial statements.”