Opinion | Trust Our Land: What happens when conservation has a home
Special to the Daily
Conservation in the Eagle Valley has always lived mostly out in the field. On protected ranches, along riverbanks, up in the High Country where the work happens. About a year ago, it also got a front door. When the Eagle Valley Land Trust established the Conservation Center in Edwards a few years ago, the idea was straightforward. Land conservation in this valley needed a permanent place worthy of the vast conserved lands throughout our community. Somewhere landowners could walk in to talk about their land and legacy. Somewhere our partner organizations could sit down together and work towards shared conservation goals. Somewhere the community could gather and rally around the places in this valley needing protection.
We hoped it would work. We did not expect it to work this fast.
In less than a year, landowners have walked through the Conservation Center’s doors to start shaping projects that might not have happened otherwise. Partners have come in for meetings and left with new ways to collaborate on shared goals that were not on anyone’s agenda when they arrived. More than 70 programs and hundreds of participants have filled the space. The conversations happening inside this building are already shaping conservation in our region.
And the Conservation Center is not even done yet. It is perched next to the Eagle River Preserve, a permanently protected stretch of river and open land that has become one of the best examples of what conservation can look like when it works. Wildlife habitat, a place to walk, a healthy river corridor running through a busy community. The Conservation Center and the Eagle River Preserve together reflect something this valley has been building toward for a long time: a place where conservation is not separate from daily life, but woven into it.
Starting this June, we are encouraging community members to stop in and join the conversation with a new free monthly series called Neighbors in Nature. This summer we will gather on July 2, Aug. 4 and Sept. 3, from 5-6:30 p.m. at the Conservation Center to sit down with a guest from our community for a relaxed, honest conversation about the land, wildlife and conservation work that defines this place. Whether you have followed EVLT for years or are just getting curious about the land outside your door, this is your invitation to pull up a chair.
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We’ll enjoy light snacks, there will be time for questions, and there is no background knowledge required. The series is offered in English and Spanish through live interpretation. Come as you are, enjoy your friendly neighborhood Conservation Center, and find out how you can be part of the work. Learn more and find parking information at evlt.org/neighbors-in-nature.
Conservation Center: The Next Phase
Getting to where we are today took years of community input, listening sessions, focus groups, and surveys. Hundreds of neighbors showed up and told us what a place like this could be. We completed Phase 1 about a year ago, and that foundation is a big part of why it is already working. Now we are moving into Phase 2: finishing the Borgen Family Foundation Terrace, adding a waterwise landscape and building a greenhouse that will allow us to invite even more of our community to use and enjoy the space. For this next chapter, we are asking our community to help us raise the funds to finish it.
One way you can support the Conservation Center is by sponsoring a commemorative brick in the Borgen Family Foundation Terrace. For a gift of $1,000, you can have a brick engraved with a name, a memory, or a message of your choosing, permanently set in the ground where this work happens every day. To be included in the first installment, commit your gift by June 30. For more information on bricks or other ways to support Phase 2, contact Katrina at 970.748.7654 or development@evlt.org.
