Cold Hollow To Canada
Cold Hollow to Canada is a non-profit organization that started in 2007 and was fully developed in 2009. The organization was formed from a shared commitment to the regions forests and wildlife and a recognition of the value they have to the communities within the region. An initial partnership with the Staying Connected initiative provided significant resources upon which to build the organization. Their vision is a healthy and intact forest landscape that can support a strong and sustainable economy through stewardship, permanent protection on wildlife habitat, and the connectivity across the entire Northern Forest. They focus on wildlife connectivity within the area as a means to ensure healthy intact, and productive forests, and used areas of core wildlife habitat in the region as a foundation for their work. Maintaining the integrity of habitat function by protecting these areas serves to maintain associated goals such as water quality and sustained working forests. The organization seeks to collect data on the health and movement of wildlife populations within these areas of core forests as a means to assess habitat quality. To that end the group worked with the Keeping Track Monitoring Program to train citizen scientist within the community to go out and find the information needed. The program focuses on focal-species like moose, bear, bobcat, etc. The organization is engaged in a number of other projects focused on wildlife, stewardship of our forests, and land conservation. Other work includes working with municipalities on planning and zoning, working with landowners on conservation easements, education and outreach, and coordination between local conservation commissions and non-profits. A host of other partners have aided the organization and has helped them out on many occasions.
Bakersfield, Belvidere, Enosburg, Fletcher, Montgomery, Waterville
Forest Land, Outreach, partnerships, Town Plan, wildlife
Accomplishments of Cold Hollow to Canada includes 1.) Training citizen scientists and monitoring areas of core wildlife habitat as part of the Keep Track Program, inspiring community participation in the long-term stewardship of wildlife habitat, an amazing opportunity to engage member of the community in collecting data on wildlife populations. 2.) Assisting municipalities in town planning for conservation. 3.) Working with landowners on conservation easements. 4.) Working with groups of forestland owners on the landscape level to manage for wildlife across ownership boundaries.
2 Countries 1 Forest www.2c1forest.org
Wildlands Network www.wildlandsnetwork.org
Vermont Natural Resource Council www.vnrc.org
Enosburg Conservation Commission
Bakersfield Conservation Commission
Richford Conservation Commission
Keeping Track www.keepingtrack.org
VT Wild and Scenic Rivers www.vtwsr.org
Ruiter Valley Land Trust, Quebec, Canada www.valleeruiter.org
Appalachian Corridor Appalachien (ACA), Quebec, Canada www.apcor.ca
The reason why this organization has been very successful is because they have had committed volunteers, as well as all the partners that they have worked with both within Vermont as well as in Canada.
The biggest challenge faced by the organization is time and capacity. The organization is volunteer based, with only one part-time staff member for a portion of the organizations lifespan. Funding can also be a problem because donor organizations will often provide funding on a project basis (with defined deliverables) but not for capacity building within the organization, such as hiring a permanent part-time coordinator.
Cold Hollow to Canada