The
Colorado Land Stewardship
Mapping Project
Methodology and
Recommendations from
a Prototype of Larimer County
Final report submitted
December 9, 1999 to
The Great Outdoors Colorado
Trust Fund
Will Shafroth, Director
Written by
David M. Theobald, Gary
Wockner, and N. Thompson Hobbs
Natural Resource Ecology
Laboratory
Colorado
State University
Acknowledgments
We wish to thank the following
individuals who gave critical guidance to the project and provided helpful suggestions
and comments: Lise Aangeenbrug, Deputy Director for Programs, State
Board of the Great Outdoors Colorado Trust Fund; Jim Crain, Director,
Open Space/Real Estate, City of Boulder; Mary Klein, Director, Colorado
Natural Heritage Program; Betsy Neely, Director of Conservation
Planning, The Nature Conservancy of Colorado; Laura Stone, Executive
Director, Larimer Land Trust; and Ruth Wright, former member of the
Great Outdoors Colorado Board and whose vision and initiative drove this
project.
We also are grateful to a number of
other people who not only provided the GIS data used in this project, but keen
insight into the problems associated with land stewardship mapping: Dan
Kunis, Larimer County Planning Department; Jeff Rulli, Larimer
County GIS; John Armstrong, Barry Baker, Lee Grunau, and Katie
Pague from the Colorado Natural Heritage Program; Rob Billerbeck,
Colorado State Parks; Bill Martin, Southern Rockies Ecosystem Project; Heidi
van Everen and Caren McMahan, The Nature Conservancy of Colorado; Wendell
Amos, Estes Valley Land Trust; Don Schrupp and Francie Pusateri,
Colorado Division of Wildlife; Claudia Benedict, Katy Carpenter,
and Karen Manci, City of Fort Collins; Ron Thomas, Rocky Mountain
National Park; Meeghan Flenniken, Larimer County Parks and Open Lands
Department; Julie Trombley and Tom Greene, City of Loveland; Paula
Lozowski, USDA Forest Service; Bill Killip and Alden Whittaker,
Colorado State Land Board; Bob Joseph and Shawn Kraft, Town of
Estes Park; Julie Birdsong, Colorado State University Research
Foundation; Greg Vatican, City of Thornton Water Resources; Brenda
Gimeson, Larimer County Rural Land Use Center; and Ken Schauer,
Bureau of Land Management.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments. i
Table of Contents. ii
Executive Summary.. iii
Introduction.. 1
Project
Objectives. 4
Methodology.. 5
Review of related efforts. 5
Data dictionary. 6
Mapping. 7
Results. 10
How might stewardship mapping be extended to other counties?. 15
How to disseminate and keep current?. 15
How should sensitive data be handled?. 16
How to refine stewardship designations?. 17
Appendix I –
Availability of County parcel databases. 19
Appendix II –
Data dictionary questionnaire. 21
Appendix III –
Data dictionary.. 23
Executive Summary
In March 1999, the Great Outdoors
Colorado Board (GOCO) asked Colorado State University to develop a method for
mapping land stewardship. This investigation led to the Colorado Land Stewardship
Mapping (CLSM) project. Agencies and
organizations that are interested in protecting open space, agricultural land,
and wildlife habitat require information about the patterns of land ownership
and stewardship in Colorado. This information is critical for assisting local
and state organizations understand what is currently protected, identify
opportunities for partnering in conservation activities, and setting
priorities. For example, a series of
related questions have been raised by local and state agencies across Colorado:
How many acres of private land in
Colorado have been conserved in the past decade? Which significant open space
lands have been protected? Where are the best opportunities to protect critical
lands in the future? Unfortunately,
a consistent and up-to-date map that provides baseline information to help
answer these questions is not available on a statewide basis.
Objectives
The overall goal of the CLSM
project was to develop a methodology to create a statewide land stewardship
map, by developing a prototype in Larimer County. To achieve this goal, we pursued three objectives:
1.
Establish a list of the types of data that need to be
collected and to specify these data in a formal and standardized data
dictionary;
2.
Develop a land stewardship map for a prototype county
(Larimer County) and document the process and methods by which the stewardship
map was created;
3.
Identify important issues and problems encountered and make
recommendations on how a statewide stewardship map could be developed,
maintained, and disseminated.
Larimer County was selected as the prototype study area
because it contains a representative mixture of land owners and conservation
activities, there was keen interest from conservation organizations, and pieces
of the land stewardship database were already available. Importantly, while information on land
ownership and stewardship are fundamental to informed and strategic
conservation activities and the findings of this project will help steer future
efforts, we did not attempt to answer any of the motivating questions outlined
above – those are beyond the scope of this project.
Results
We found
that the CLSM map provides much more detailed information than the existing
base maps (i.e. BLM Land Surface Status maps) that are typically used to
produce statewide land ownership maps.
For example, in Larimer County over 32,000 thousand acres of land are
owned by local governments and managed as parks, open space, or natural areas,
and another 13,000 acres have conservation easements placed on them through
land trusts.
Recommendations
Mapping city and county lands and
land trust holdings is best accomplished at the local level. Identifying and supporting a contact person
in each county who would be responsible for collecting and maintaining local
level data is a key to successfully extending stewardship mapping to other
counties in Colorado. Also, we
recommend that two steps be taken to coordinate data across federal, state, and
local entities. The first step is to identify
and compile a comprehensive, detailed listing of all the organizations across
the state that have responsibility for primary data about land ownership and
stewardship. This could be expanded to
a “Colorado GIS Directory” that contains links to the wealth of GIS data
resources that exist, but are not readily available and accessible because they
are too diffuse and in a state of constant flux. The next step is promote a central data clearinghouse or coordinator
that compiles primary data sets into statewide maps that are consistent,
standardized, and fully supported maps.
There are large efficiencies to be
gained by having a clearinghouse or coordinating group compile and disseminate
land stewardship data. Agencies and
organizations that are primary data collectors would provide data to the
coordinating group, minimizing time and hassle of data requests. The coordinating group would process the
primary data, ensure a standard and consistent format, and resolve
discrepancies. Potential users of the
land stewardship map would download the current version directly from the
coordinating group. Besides improving
efficiencies, the overall quality and detail of the land ownership maps will
likely improve as well.
A major concern raised during the
course of this project was that property owners who have donated property or
development rights to land trusts will not want information about their
properties disclosed. We identified a
range of possible ways to handle this potential problem. But, until a well-documented plan to handle
this issue is in place, we recommend that only parcels for which land trusts or
the owners themselves have provided express written consent be shown on public
maps.
Introduction
A foremost concern among
Coloradoans is maintaining a high quality of life, especially in the face of a
burgeoning population and expanding development. The Great Outdoors Colorado’s recent strategic planning process
reflects the desires of Coloradoans to protect land, water, and wildlife. For
example, 71.5% of total funds are allocated to these related programs. Organizations that are interested in
protecting open space, agricultural land, and wildlife habitat require
information about the patterns of land ownership and stewardship in Colorado. This information is critical for assisting
local and state organizations understand what is currently protected, identify
opportunities for partnering in conservation activities, and setting
priorities.
A number of related questions have
been raised recently by multiple organizations and government agencies in
Colorado, for example:
·
How many acres of
private land in Colorado have been conserved in the past decade?
·
What proportion
of critical wildlife habitat has been conserved?
·
How many acres of
threatened agricultural lands have been kept in production?
·
Which significant
open space lands have been protected?
·
Where are the
best opportunities to protect critical lands in the future?
·
What parcels
contain easements that should preclude issuance of a building permit?
These questions require basic information about land
stewardship to be known and readily accessible. A good way to inform these questions is to refer to a current,
detailed map of the distribution and patterns of land stewardship. Here we make an important distinction
between land ownership and land stewardship. Because conservationists need to know not only who (or what
agency) owns a particular parcel of land, but how land is being managed
relative to open space, recreation, or wildlife habitat goals, we focus on land
stewardship in this report. For
example, Larimer County owns numerous parcels of land that are actively managed
(used) for goals that range from a municipal dump to developed parks to natural
areas. Clearly, simply knowing who owns
land misses significant differences in the quality of the land that are
important to conservation activities.
At a statewide scale, a useful
resource to help form the basis for such a map is the Bureau of Land
Management’s Land Surface Status map series. Although the BLM maps provide an excellent
basis on which to begin mapping land ownership for Colorado, there are four
significant shortcomings of these maps.
First, activities occur on a semi-annual, quarterly, or even monthly
basis that significantly modify the distribution of land. Because land ownership changes rapidly, maps
of ownership and stewardship become obsolete quickly, within months in some
cases. In fact, many of the BLM maps
are up to 10 to 15 years old, making this data alone inadequate for decision
making about conservation, which requires current, up-to-date, detailed
information.
Second, the BLM maps are focused
mostly on mapping public lands, not private land ownership. So, even though private land conservation is
a very active and important sector of conservation activities, these maps do
not detail even large areas (>500 acres) of privately-held, conserved
lands. For example, various private
organizations such as The Nature Conservancy and numerous land trusts hold parcels
in fee simple and in conservation easements, and local governments frequently
own large city- or county-owned parks or open space. These lands are almost never included in the BLM ownership maps. In fact, many of these lands are not
currently mapped even by the agencies and organizations who own them.
Third, limited information is
available about when a parcel was placed under protection, making it difficult
to assess and evaluate efforts to protect the land. This difficulty is compounded as some leases and conservation
tools will expire after a prescribed number of years. For example, some conservation easements in Larimer County are
limited to 40 years. Also, much of the
land ownership pattern in Colorado dates to the early 1900s and we have a sense
that this pattern is fairly static. But
land exchanges between private and public, especially federal, agencies have
occurred on a fairly steady basis. For
instance, over 15,000 acres of BLM lands in Colorado were exchanged in 1998
alone,
and the Colorado Coalition of Land Trusts
estimates that over 500,000 acres are held by land trusts in Colorado in
1998. The land ownership pattern is, in
fact, dynamic and ever changing.
Finally, as mentioned earlier, current maps provide moderately detailed information
about land ownership on public lands, but they do not detail important
information about how the land is being managed relative to open space,
recreation, or wildlife habitat goals.
Maintaining an updated, accurate
land ownership map is difficult in part because of the sheer number of public
agencies and private individuals and organizations that are active in land
conservation. Although there is ad
hoc coordination among government agencies, there is no formal arrangement
among involved parties nor is there a single entity charged with coordinating
and tracking these landscape changes.
As a result, information required for conservation activities is
difficult to obtain because it is diffuse, not coordinated, non-standardized,
and requires frequent updating. And
although ownership information for all parcels is available at assessor’s
offices throughout the state, it is extremely time-consuming to use as a
primary source of information for a mapping effort. For example, county clerk offices typically handle many thousands
of recorded transactions per month, so tracking private and public land changes
is a challenging problem. Furthermore,
critical data about how the parcel is being managed relative to stewardship are
generally not recorded on parcel plat maps.
Clearly,
providing a statewide land stewardship map to inform conservation activities is
a significant, but worthy, challenge.
In the face of this challenge however, there are some opportunities. The most important one is to leverage the
investment many city and county governments have made in geographic information
system (GIS) databases. A fundamental
data layer in these databases is information about parcels and ownership. Parcel-level databases, if available through
a city or county, provide detailed information about ownership from which
mapping land stewardship can begin.
We conducted a brief telephone
survey to determine the extent to which county governments in Colorado have
developed a parcel-level database.
One-quarter of Colorado counties have a complete parcel map compiled,
and roughly one-quarter are more than 50% complete (one to two years away from
completion) (see Figure 1 and Appendix 1).
However, half of Colorado counties are lacking the databases that could
provide the basis for a land stewardship database.
Project Objectives
In November 1998, the Great
Outdoors Colorado Board identified the need to explore the types of data needed
and an appropriate methodology that could be used to create a suitable spatial
database from which to support conservation activities in Colorado. In March of 1999, the Colorado Land
Stewardship Mapping (CLSM) project was initiated to develop a methodology for
creating a statewide land stewardship map.
This final report documents the findings of the CLSM project.
The overall goal of this project
was to develop a methodology to create a statewide land ownership-stewardship
map. To achieve this goal, we
identified three objectives:
1.
Establish a list of types of data that should be
collected and specify these data in a formal and standardized data dictionary;
2.
Develop a land stewardship map for a prototype county
(Larimer County) and document the process and methods by which the stewardship
map was created;
3.
Identify important issues and problems encountered and make
recommendations on how a statewide stewardship map could be developed,
maintained, and disseminated.
Larimer County was selected as the pilot study area because
it contains a representative mixture of land owners and conservation
activities, there was keen interest from important conservation groups, and
pieces of the land stewardship database were already available. Importantly, while information on land ownership
and stewardship are fundamental to informed conservation activities and the
findings of this project will help to steer future efforts, we did not attempt
to answer any of the common questions that motivate this project – these are
beyond the scope of this project.
The remainder of this report is organized as
follows. First, we describe the land
stewardship mapping process we developed for Larimer County. This includes the development of a detailed
data dictionary and GIS methodologies.
Next, we describe the Larimer County Land Stewardship map that we
created, including computing typical statistics from the map. Finally, we make broad recommendations about
how a statewide land stewardship mapping effort could best be achieved.
Methodology
There are a number of related efforts that have produced
similar maps of land stewardship, and a cursory review of these efforts should
identify previously discovered difficulties and solutions. The USGS National Gap Analysis Program
methodology requires
maps of species distributions to be compared to areas that are protected. Protected areas are defined on a land
stewardship map that combines attributes of ownership, management, and a
measure of intent to maintain biodiversity.
Four status categories are defined, from highest protection to lowest:
Status 1: An area having permanent
protection from conversion of natural land cover and a mandated management plan
in operation to maintain a natural state within which disturbance events (of
natural type, frequency, intensity, and legacy) are allowed to proceed without
interference or are mimicked through management.
Status 2: An area having permanent
protection from conversion of natural land cover and a mandated management plan
in operation to maintain a primarily natural state, but which may receive uses
or management practices that degrade the quality of existing natural
communities, including suppression of natural disturbance.
Status 3: An area having permanent
protection from conversion of natural land cover for the majority of the area,
but subject to extractive uses of either a broad, low-intensity type (e.g.,
logging) or localized intense type (e.g., mining). It also confers protection
to federally listed endangered and threatened species throughout the area.
Status 4: There are no known public
or private institutional mandates or legally recognized easements or deed
restrictions held by the managing entity to prevent conversion of natural
habitat types to anthropogenic habitat types. The area generally allows
conversion to unnatural land cover throughout.
While we found the GAP methodology
to be highly instructive, we did not want to assign a status level to each
parcel we mapped, for two reasons.
First, it would be very difficult to acquire the level of detailed data
for the numerous parcels that occur at the local level required by the
methodology, such as management plans.
Second, and more importantly, we reasoned that stewardship mapping
should emphasize the collection of the base attribute data for each parcel that
are used to assign status categories, rather than assigning status
categories. This ultimately provides a
more flexible system that can be used by a broad array of potential users, for
a wide range of purposes.
The Nature Conservancy
has developed an approach that evaluates land ownership and management to
determine the degree to which areas contribute to conservation of targeted
biodiversity. It also assigns one of
four status categories to all areas of a landscape:
L1: Lands owned by private entities and managed
for biodiversity conservation or administered by public agencies and specially
designated for biodiversity conservation through legislative action where
natural disturbance events proceed without interference (e.g., TNC preserves,
wilderness areas).
L2: Lands generally managed for their natural
values, but that may incur use (e.g., habitat manipulation for game species)
that degrades the quality of natural communities (e.g., state wildlife
management areas, federal research natural areas).
L3: Lands maintained for multiple uses,
including consumptive or recreational values, and not specifically or wholly
dedicated to biodiversity conservation, and lands with restricted development
rights (e.g., forest lands, regional and local parks and open space).
L4: Lands with no known protection, including
lands used for intensive human activity; agricultural, residential, and urban
lands.
Again, this approach is well-thought out and very
instructive. However, because of the
wide range of issues that the land stewardship map would potentially be used
for, we focused our efforts on providing base attribute information, rather
than categorize each parcel using status categories. Furthermore, we devoted more of our resources to provide detailed
mapping of lands owned and managed by local governments and land trusts.
We initially developed a list of all attribute data
types collected for each parcel by brainstorming a preliminary list. We refined this list by comparing it to data
collected for related efforts and through review by the advisory
committee. We then sent this draft data
dictionary out for review to a number of agencies and organizations, including
in an informal survey distributed at the Colorado Coalition of Land Trust
annual meeting in April 1999 (see Appendix II). The most important attributes for land stewardship mapping are
described briefly in Table 1 (refer to Appendix III for the full data
dictionary).
Identifying attributes that would
be valuable was fairly straightforward.
We found it more challenging to remove candidate attributes that were
unlikely to be able to be meaningfully filled, because it was too difficult to
acquire data for these attributes. For
instance, though information about water and mineral rights is extremely
important when determining a parcel’s conservation value, these data are in
practice difficult and time-consuming to acquire.
Table 1.
Important attributes for land stewardship mapping
|
Attribute
|
Description
|
|
Name
|
This is the name of the
parcel, typically referring to a previous owner or from historical
designation. Many of the
federally-owned parcels do not have a detailed name. Some private land owners may not want this
field to be publicly disclosed.
|
|
Acres
|
Simply the number of acres
of the parcel, as calculated by the GIS on the parcel maps.
|
|
Owner
|
Self-explanatory. Most parcels are owned by public agencies,
but others are private individuals.
Many private land owners have requested their names removed from data
that is distributed to the public.
|
|
Owner type
|
This identifies the level of ownership, as federal,
state, local, or private. Local
refers to any local government agency such as a city or county. Land trusts are considered private.
|
|
Owner confidential
|
A flag that denotes whether the parcel information
is not disclosed for public uses.
|
|
Manager
|
The parcel owner typically
manages the land as well, but occasionally, another agency or organization
manages the land (e.g., CDOW)
|
|
Management contact
|
This is the name and
address of the person to contact for questions regarding management of a
parcel.
|
|
Management type
|
This attribute denotes what the parcel is managed
for. For example, cities may own
developed parks, open space, and natural areas (see full list of examples in
Appendix II). This is perhaps the
most critical and complicated attribute because it is at the heart of
defining the level of stewardship.
One confounding issue is that various organizations may use similar
terms to denote slightly different management objectives. We chose the type based on the agency’s
description or based on conversations with managers.
|
|
Year acquired
|
The year a parcel was “conserved” by an agency or
owner. While most of the public land
dates back to the early 1900s, it is particularly important to determine the
acquisition dates of land trust and city/county open space lands.
|
|
Monitor
|
For parcels that have a
conservation easement in place, the monitor is the land trust or organization
that is entrusted with monitoring
compliance with the easement.
|
|
Natural System Monitoring
Frequency
|
This is the frequency that natural system monitoring
is done by the monitoring agency. For
example, if the parcel is protected to conserve a particular imperiled
species, there is typically some field monitoring or sampling of the status
and distribution of that species.
Typically, sampling is conducted at annual or multi-year intervals to
assess and adjust management activities.
|
|
Natural Use Frequency
|
This is the frequency that
the parcel is monitored to determine if allowed uses are conducted according
to the management plan, and that prohibited uses are not being violated. This field typically is used for land trust
lands.
|
|
Protection vehicle
|
This is the legal instrument the manager and monitor
has with the parcel owner.
|
|
Protection expiration
|
This is the date (year)
the protection expires. Although most
parcels are owned “in perpetuity”, occasionally conservation easements tie up
development rights for a limited period (e.g., the Larimer County Rural Land
Use Process’ 40 year minimum).
|
|
Data date
|
This is the date the
parcel and attributes were initially entered into (or updated) the GIS
database.
|
|
GIS contact
|
This is the person to
contact for questions regarding the mapping of a parcel. This person usually works for the
management agency.
|
|
Public access
|
This field denotes whether
public access is restricted on this parcel.
|
|
Comments
|
This field is used to describe anything unusual or
specific about the parcel. For
example, details about parcels relating to State Land Board affiliation or
surface or mineral leasing rights are encoded in this field.
|
The first
step in the mapping process was to identify the various agencies and
organizations that owned and/or managed land in Larimer County. Within Larimer County, land is owned by a wide
variety of federal and state agencies, city and county governments, and land
trust and other organizations. We
collected a number of existing maps that provided a basis from which to begin
mapping land stewardship (see Table 2).
The primary data set was, as mentioned earlier, the BLM Land Surface
Status maps. Based on this map, the
Colorado Gap project updated many of the public land boundaries, and a map from
Larimer County Planning Department provided further details about both city and
county-owned lands. Also, we found that
three land trusts hold land in Larimer County -- Larimer Land Trust, Estes
Valley Land Trust, and The Nature Conservancy.
We then geo-referenced all of the
maps to the same projection (UTM, Zone 13) and datum (NAD83) so that we could
overlay them. There was little
difficulty involved in this phase – most data sets were provided in an industry
standard format and were
readily re-projected. Most data sets were digitized from 1:100,000
scale maps, though some were at 1:24,000 scale. However, a major cause of difficulty in compiling the CLSM map
occurred when two or more maps showed differences in boundaries or ownership at
a particular location. For example, the
land ownership pattern near Phantom Canyon Preserve is relatively complex, with
State Land Board lands managed by the Division of Wildlife, various
conservation easements and private lands, and the Phantom Canyon preserve
itself. We had 3 or 4 maps that did not
consistently map this area, and we had to develop a method to correct these
discrepancies, which we discuss below.
We established an iterative process
of identifying discrepancies and then correcting discrepancies. We then confirmed corrections by both
re-identifying discrepancies and confirmed corrections with primary data
sources and involved GIS personnel.
Table 2. Primary data sources for Larimer County Land
Stewardship map.
|
Level
|
Agency/Organization
|
Map Name
|
Date
|
|
Federal
|
BLM
|
Land
Surface Status
|
1980s,
1990s
|
|
USDA
– Forest Service
|
Arapaho-Roosevelt
National Forest boundaries
|
1998
|
|
USDI
– National Park Service
|
|
|
|
State
|
Division
of Wildlife
|
Gap
Stewardship
State
Wildlife Areas
|
1997
|
|
State
Land Board
|
State
Land Trust lands
|
1999
|
|
Parks
|
State
parks
Natural
Areas Program
|
1999
|
|
Local
|
|
Ownership
Parcels
and plat maps
Parks
and Open Spaces
|
1999
|
|
|
City
boundary
Natural
areas
City
Parks
|
1999
|
|
|
City
parks
Open
space
|
1998
|
|
|
Parcels
Open
space
|
1999
|
|
Non-profit
|
The
Nature Conservancy
|
Phantom
Canyon Preserve
|
1999
|
|
Larimer
Land Trust
|
Conservation
easements
|
1999
|
|
Estes
Valley Land Trust
|
Conservation
easements
|
1999
|
Identifying problems
There were three ways that we
identified discrepancies between maps.
First, we overlayed the maps and visually inspected them for
discrepancies, typically browsing township by township. A second way was to incrementally add
parcels from one map to a base map and then automatically check for parcels
that overlapped, using GIS analysis.
A third way we identified
discrepancies was to acquire a list of tax-exempt parcels from the County Assessor’s
office. Most parcels owned by public
agencies are recorded in this database.
We were able to link this list of parcels to a parcel map, which
assisted us in identifying a number of further discrepancies. Moreover, we found over one hundred additional
parcels that were owned by agencies not yet contacted, such as the Colorado
State University Research Foundation, the State Board of Agriculture, and the
City of Thornton. Many of these parcels
were mountain watershed and reservoirs, agricultural research areas, or
wastewater facilities. For example, the
Assessor’s database showed that the City of Fort Collins Wastewater Division
owned several sections of land in the northeast corner of the county. After contacting this Division, we found
that the City uses this land to spread treated waste and manages much of it for
wildlife restoration in conjunction with agriculture. These map data from the Assessor’s office gave information about
activities of agencies not usually associated with land conservation, and thus
provided a significant value addition to the map as well as an important way to
identify discrepancies.
There were two types of
discrepancies among map: boundary and feature discrepancies. The most common type of boundary discrepancy
was when the same feature was depicted slightly differently in different
maps. For example, maps A and B might
show the boundaries for Rocky Mountain National Park, but the boundaries did
not coincide. There were three causes
for this boundary discrepancy.
The first was caused by small differences in digitizing that resulted in
very thin “sliver” polygons. These
sliver polygons are well known (and well despised) in the GIS field and are
artifacts of the digitizing and editing process. We eliminated these by adjusting the boundaries to a standard
reference map. Where there were
insignificant differences between boundary lines (i.e. less than ~30 m), we
simply ignored the discrepancy.
A second cause of boundary
discrepancy was from maps that used a different geodetic control to establish
the locations of section corners. Most
of these discrepancies were very small and narrow (similar to sliver
polygons). Larimer County has established
its own geodetic control network, but because we wanted to ensure our work was
readily transferred and integrated into a statewide effort, we used the
existing BLM control network. A third
cause for discrepancies was that, in fact, the boundary on one map had changed
because land was either sold or acquired.
These were “real” changes that needed to be resolved.
The other type of discrepancy
occurred when one feature was delineated in one map but not in another. This feature discrepancy occurred for
most of the local and non-profit data sources, which provided data about city
and county parks and land trust parcels.
These discrepancies were relatively easy to identify and correct. Visually inspecting and browsing the maps
quickly turned up most of the feature discrepancies and large boundary
discrepancies. We also examined the
map using topological analysis, which provided a systematic way to identify
smaller discrepancies.
Correcting discrepancies
Because each map typically covered the entire county
and most maps contained between 500 and 700 features, there were many discrepancies
to be resolved. It quickly became
apparent that when a “real” discrepancy was found, we needed to prioritize each
data source to determine which map was “correct”. We corrected discrepancies in one of three ways. First, we used the boundaries delineated on
the map obtained from the agency that owns the parcel. For example, if a parcel was delineated on
the National Park Service’s map as National Park, while the Forest Service’s
map showed the same parcel as privately owned, the Park Service’s information
was deemed correct. However, this rule
of thumb was occasionally difficult to apply, especially when the ownership of
a parcel was in contention, not just the boundaries.
The second way discrepancies were resolved
was by contacting the agencies involved.
We did this when discrepancies were more complicated, involving several
agencies or numerous boundaries between parcels. Agency GIS personnel usually responded
quickly and decisively, and conflicts were readily resolved. About mid-way through the project we
compiled a draft map and sent it out in its entirety to the GIS contacts of
each agency for review.
As a last resort, we resolved
discrepancies by examining data at the Larimer County Assessor’s office to find
land boundaries and owners. Although
this is the primary and ultimate data source, it is complicated and
time-consuming to research parcel ownership through this means.
Results
The Larimer
County Land Stewardship Map provides the most up-to-date and detailed land
stewardship map available (see figures Countywide
Land Owner, Countywide Management Type, Fort Collins Land Owner, Estes
Park Land Owner, and database detail map). There are over 1,000 polygons identified in
the CLSM map, in contrast to roughly 700 in the original BLM map. Some important differences occur between the
new map and the BLM map (Table 3). The
number of federally-owned acres has increased by roughly 3%, largely due to a
number of acquisitions in the past decade in the northern part of the county
that fill-in the checkerboard pattern.
The area of land identified as state ownership has also increased
substantially. The majority of the
increase is due to more detailed and comprehensive mapping, rather than large
increases in state land ownership. The
biggest difference between these maps is that a number of parcels are identified
not as private land, but as under local ownership (city or county). In addition, conserved lands (open space,
natural areas, parks and easements) have increased by over 23,000 acres the
past decade (Figure 2).
Table 3. Comparison of mapped acreage in different
ownership categories.
|
Owner
|
BLM
|
CLSM
|
% Difference
|
|
Acres
|
%
|
Acres
|
%
|
|
Federal
|
789,115
|
47%
|
814,153
|
48%
|
+3.2%
|
|
State
|
76,502
|
5%
|
95,784
|
6%
|
+25.2%
|
|
Local
|
0
|
0%
|
32,727
|
2%
|
N/A
|
|
Private
|
813,287
|
48%
|
741,164
|
44%
|
-8.9%
|
Figure 2. Land conserved in Larimer County since 1980.
Recommendations
There are two issues that help determine
the amount of effort that would be required to map stewardship in other
counties in Colorado. The first is the
need for conservation, roughly indicated by the amount of conservation activity
that is occurring in a county. For
instance, many of the Front Range counties have comprehensive open space
acquisition programs funded by tax revenues.
Other counties may not have an open-space tax, but have a lot of land
trust activity in the area. The second
issue that influences the ease of mapping stewardship in a county is the extent
to which current, electronic parcel databases are available. One good indicator of this is the
availability of a parcel-level GIS database.
The availability of such a database is widely variable across Colorado
(see Appendix I), and only 25% of counties have fully completed a parcel
database. The remaining counties are at
least a year from having a parcel database.
Moreover, few land trusts have their holdings in a GIS database.
A well-established, standardized
process for collecting data is needed because of the numerous entities involved
in conservation across the state. We
recommend a two-tiered strategy for implementing a statewide land stewardship
mapping effort. First, we recognize
that data about city and county lands and land trust holdings is best acquired
at the local level. It was clear in
Larimer County that an important factor in their success in collecting
comprehensive, timely information was the individual effort of key GIS
personnel. It follows that success at
the statewide level is contingent on identifying and supporting a contact
person in each county who would be responsible for collecting and maintaining
local level data. However, there is a
clear opportunity to support the efforts of local governments. It is inefficient for local-level personnel
to need to compile data about lands held by state and federal agencies. Rather, coordinating state and federal data
at a level that cuts across all levels of government and non-profit groups is
an important opportunity.
We also found that currently it is
difficult to identify parcels with conservation easements in county assessor
databases. For example, there is no
standard local or statewide method to identify parcel records with easements so
these may be tracked. Without some way
to flag these parcels, county planning agencies are challenged to
systematically identify parcels that should not be issued a building permit
because of restrictive easements, and statewide assessments of conservation activities
are not possible. We recommend that
assessors should track these parcels using a consistent methodology.
Sharing GIS
data among agencies and organizations has been greatly facilitated by the
Internet, and most parties freely share data with others. However, a very important but challenging
job is to create and maintain accurate meta-data (i.e. descriptions and proper
uses of data). For example, we received
numerous data sets second-hand in an effort to reduce burdening the primary
data keepers, so it was difficult to understand some data sets, and ultimately
we needed to contact the primary keepers of the data.
Moreover, there is a lot of
duplicated effort among agencies and organizations that use land stewardship
information (and other data as well).
Because many agencies and organizations work on a project by project
basis, a land stewardship map has a limited life. These maps are typically created, used, and then are left to
languish. Also, each project has a
unique study area boundary, which typically is only a portion of Colorado and
these frequently span administrative boundaries such as city and county
boundaries. The consequence of
project-based work is that each time a user requires land ownership
information, the primary data keepers are contacted, the request fulfilled, and
a new map compiled.
We recommend that two steps be
taken to coordinate data across federal, state, and local entities. The first step is to identify and compile a
comprehensive, detailed listing of all the organizations (and contact names)
across the state that have responsibility for primary data about land ownership
and stewardship. The compiled list
would provide users of Colorado land stewardship data one location that would
have links to the most current, up-to-date data. This list also could be
incorporated into an existing National Spatial Data Infrastructure meta-data
clearinghouse that contains a broader range of data. This effort could be expanded to encompass a
broader range of data, eventually becoming a general “Colorado GIS Directory”
that would contain links to the wealth of GIS data resources that exist, but
are not readily available and accessible because they are too diffuse and in a
state of constant flux.
The next step is to promote a
modest effort to develop a centralized data clearinghouse or provide a
coordinating role to compile primary data sets into statewide maps that are
consistent, standardized, and fully supported maps. To compile maps specifically for land stewardship would
not require establishing a whole new division or agency.
There are large efficiencies to be
gained by having a coordinating group or agency compile and disseminate land
ownership data. In this model, holders
of the primary data would distribute and explain their data only to the
coordinating group, and only when they have gone through an update cycle. The time and hassle of primary data keepers
would be minimized because they would no longer be required to handle numerous,
individual requests. The coordinating
group would collect data, ensure a standard and consistent format, and resolve
discrepancies. This should improve the
overall quality and detail of the land ownership maps as well. Finally, users who need current land
stewardship map would download it directly from the coordinating group. This would eliminate each users’ difficult
chore of reconciling discrepancies among disparate data sources, dates, and
scales.
During our
discussions with agencies and organizations around the state, we were cautioned
that some of the stewardship data were sensitive and should not be disseminated
broadly, and particularly through a publicly-accessible vehicle (e.g., an FTP
site). These concerns were raised
mostly with regards to releasing information about conservation easement
lands. For example, land owners who
have donated conservation easements will likely want to protect their privacy
by not allowing their names (in the owner name field) or possibly even the
parcel boundaries to be accessible on any publicly-available documents. Driving this caution is the possibility that the public may perceive
that land with a conservation easement in place is accessible to the public,
though in fact very few have granted explicit access.
To
initially explore the magnitude of these concerns, the Larimer Land Trust
drafted a release form and surveyed their land owners. Only one of twelve land owners did not want
their names or parcel boundaries disclosed in publicly-available
documents.
There are a
range of alternative ways these maps could be presented to alleviate potential
concerns. For those owners who do not
want their names to be associated with a map parcel, the owner name can be left
blank. For those owners who do not wish the location of their property to be
disclosed, the boundaries can be “fuzzified” through a number of
mechanisms. First, only hard-copy maps
at a relatively coarse scale (so accurate locations cannot be obtained) could
be provided. Second, property
boundaries could be merged into a larger polygon, such as a section (1 square
mile) or township (6 square miles). A third possibility is to control access to
the detailed private information by requiring potential users of the data to
provide information about who they are and for what purpose they intend to use
the data. A final alternative is that
no public distribution of the data would be made available, but specific
requests and reports using the detailed data could be generated. However, until a well-documented plan to
handle this issue is in place and because of the sensitivity of this issue, we
recommend that only parcels for which land trusts or owners have provided
express written consent be shown on public maps.
Even though the data dictionary compiled for this report has advanced
beyond previous attempts at stewardship mapping, we feel that an extended
effort is needed both to refine stewardship designations and acquire more
detailed map information. The
management type attribute and possible codings we defined is an important step
towards providing readily attainable, useful information. However, the complexity of defining the
importance of a parcel for a particular conservation purpose requires that a
number of additional dimensions should be defined. A national example of extending simple land use designations to
incorporate a richer range of characteristics is the American Planning
Association’s Land-Based Classification Standards (LBCS) project. The LBCS provides a consistent model for
classifying land uses and
…extends the notion of
classifying land uses by refining traditional categories into multiple
dimensions, such as activities, functions, building types, site development
character, and ownership constraints. Each dimension has its own set of
categories and subcategories for classifying land uses. By classifying every
land-use across multiple dimensions, users can have precise control of land-use
classifications.
Another
area in which this mapping methodology should be refined in the future is to
acquire more detailed mapped information about how public lands are being
managed. For instance, we distinguished
between National Forest and Wilderness because information is readily
available. But there are many other
aspects about National Forests that should be included as well, such as where
off-road vehicles are allowed and where roadless areas are located. Nearly every publicly-owned piece of land
has a variety of uses on it, which should be fully detailed on the stewardship
map. Another example is BLM lands,
which are managed for a wide variety of uses, including nearly 623,000 acres
managed as areas of critical environmental concern.
Appendix
I – Availability of County parcel databases
Appendix
II – Data dictionary questionnaire
Appendix
III – Data dictionary
