Protected Lands Workgroup

Meetings

About

The working farms, forests and natural, historic and cultural areas around the Chesapeake Bay watershed are central to creating the Chesapeake’s sense of place. These landscapes connect us to deep traditions and to economic and ecological values. Conserving them is vital to our quality of life.

The governors of Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia, the mayor of the District of Columbia, the chair of the Chesapeake Bay Commission and the federal government collectively set the first collaborative, far-reaching goal for protecting lands in the Chesapeake Bay watershed as part of the Chesapeake 2000 agreement: "Permanently preserve from development 20 percent of the land area in the watershed by 2010." By 2008, two years ahead of schedule, through leadership from governors and investments by state legislatures, localities, the federal government, landowners and non-governmental organizations, this goal was achieved.

In 2009, President Obama issued a Chesapeake Bay Executive Order tasking federal agencies with efforts to help stimulate further progress, including to "expand public access to waters and open spaces of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries from Federal lands and conserve landscapes and ecosystems of the Chesapeake Bay watershed." In response, the National Park Service convened more than 50 representatives of conservation, historic preservation and public access agencies and non-governmental organizations to develop recommendations for advancing land conservation and public access. This formed the basis for the land conservation and public access goals in the Strategy for Protecting and Restoring the Chesapeake Bay Watershed issued in 2010.

The National Park Service and the Chesapeake Conservancy continued to convene the 50+ conservation partners to coordinate collaboration on achieving conservation goals. By 2013, this led to a decision to formalize the group as what is now known as the Chesapeake Conservation Partnership. Further, the partners strongly advocated for inclusion of the land conservation (and public access) goals established in 2010 in the new Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement being negotiated and ultimately adopted in 2014. The agreement reaffirmed and included the identical goals and outcome commitments to conserve an additional two million acres (and add 300 public access sites) by 2015.

Early on, CCP functioned as the means to address the Protected Lands Outcome for the Chesapeake Bay Program partnership. In 2023, a dedicated Protected Lands Workgroup was formed to set, implement and track the commitments toward achieving the outcome, while CCP has remained a fundamental coordinating partner and source of guidance for the workgroup. The Protected Lands Workgroup also shepherds and tracks the management strategies and workplans required by the Chesapeake Bay Program.

For more information on the Chesapeake Conservation Partnership's broader land conservation goals, projects and initiatives, visit ChesapeakeConservation.org.

Projects