How Your Contributions Are Used

Operation
Membership contributions, camp registration fees, and other unsolicited contributions (unless otherwise specified) are used to pay for the Trust's office needs, staff, insurance, professional services, communications, postage, events, membership development, the Nature Day Camp, and miscellaneous other costs. If and when the operations account accumulates an excess of working capital, the surplus is transferred to the Special Places Fund.

Special Places
The Trust's Special Places Fund is our general capital fund. It is used to pay the direct costs, such as surveying and legal fees, of acquiring new preserves and easements. It is the repository for any funds raised during a capital campaign. The fund enables the Trust to respond rapidly if needed to meet the initial costs of a major acquisition, such as a down payment, pending the success of a capital campaign.

Stewardship
The Stewardship Fund is used to pay the direct costs of managing the Trust's preserves and monitoring and enforcing the Trust's easements. Generally, the Trust tries to use only the income from the Fund for its annual management and monitoring costs; but the entire principal is available to defend and enforce the Trust's easements. Whenever the Trust accepts a preserve or an easement, the donors are requested to make a contribution to the Fund sufficient to cover the long term costs of managing that preserve or monitoring and enforcing that easement.

Community Gardens
The Community Gardens Fund is used to pay the direct costs of establishing and supporting whatever community gardens are created under the Community Gardens Program. While the Trust is not restricted from spending the principal, it plans to utilize just the income generated by the Fund in order to sustain the program for the long term.