Implementation Quilt

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Implementation Quilt
Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs
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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs

• Identify the range of implementation tools
  available for your community, region and state

• Fee Simple Acquisition
• Conservation Easements
• Non-Structural Storm Water Management Programs
• Mitigation Banking
• Best Management Practices for Working Lands
• Floodplain Regulations
• Conservation Development
• Parks and Open Space Programs
• Historic/Archaeological Site Protection

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs

• Match financial, management and other identified
  tools to the
  different elements of your green
  infrastructure network

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs

• Identify the various people, programs and
  organizations that can act to implement the
  different elements of your network

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs

• For each element identify -
• What implementation tool will be used?
• Who will take the lead in doing it?
• When will it be undertaken?
• How will it be financed?

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs

• Every implementation quilt is unique!
• Different geographies, systems, functions
• Different available tools
• Different players
• Different economies
• Different politics
• Different timeframes based on available resources
  (people, time and funding)

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Matching Resources to Network Needs

• Quilt - a good metaphor!
• Many pieces of different sizes, shapes and
  purposes
• stitched together to create a functional whole
• by diverse people, agencies and organizations
• working together in a quilting bee that
  nurtures relationships and holds people together

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt

• General Guidance
• Not uncommon to have a gap between aspirations
  and the current capacity
• Use existing programs
• Improve communications with organizations and
  between organizations
• Partnering - Collaboration increases capacity

Pick the low hanging fruit first!
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Implementation Quilt Key Themes

• Help private landowners maintain or improve the
  steward of their lands
• Work with willing landowners on both fee
  acquisition and conservation easements to enhance
  the GI network.
• Identify and work with landowners that would
  benefit from incentive programs (NRCS, IN DNR,
  IDA) that promote best management practices and
  environmental restoration activities
• Work with Bradford Woods and surrounding
  landowners on the conservation of significant
  contiguous blocks of forest lands
• Expand Forest Legacy focus area beyond Hurricane
  Hills tract in Southern Morgan County

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Private Landowner Incentive Programs

• Classified Forest and Wildland Program
• Reduced property tax
• Provides technical assistance
• Improves the environment by helping landowner
  improve their stewardship practices

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Implementation Quilt Key Themes

• Focus on the role of rivers and stream as both
  habitat areas and corridors
• Work with local drainage boards to install and
  utilize two stage drains and other innovative
  designs to improve the environmental
  functionality of the drainage network
• Work collaboratively on Clean Water Act plans
  (319 watershed plans) to help improve water
  quality for rare species, and expanded
  recreational use of rivers and streams
• Focus on upstream restoration of Fall Creek past
  Fort Benjamin State Park

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Regulated Drains and Innovative Designs

• County Drainage Board maintain a significant grey
  infrastructure of regulated drains
• Once a stream is declared a
• regulated drain, the Drainage Board
• may clear a 75 foot buffer on
• either side of the channel
• This maintenance strategy has
• significant environmental impacts
• Two stage drains are an
• alternative design that might
• reduce the environmental impacts
• Breaking News Two stage drains will soon be
  eligible as a cost-share practice with NRCS
  Environmental Quality Incentive Program

TNC Indiana Chapter Website
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Implementation Quilt Key Themes

• Help communities become more disaster resistant
  to events such as flooding
• Support efforts to make local planning become
  more environmentally sensitive
• Encourage municipal and county participation in
  the Community Rating System, reduce repetitive
  loss properties, conserve land that is vulnerable
  to flooding as community open space
• Lobby for strong building codes
• Encourage private landowners to participate in
  the NRCS Floodplain Easement Program

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Local Level

• Floodplains
• Encourage municipalities and county participation
  in the Community Rating System
• Lobby for strong building codes
• Reduce repetitive loss properties
• Updating floodplain ordinances

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Implementation Quilt Key Themes

• Restoration, Restoration, and Restoration
• Protect mussel and Indiana Bat habitat by
  engaging in riparian and forest restoration along
  core aquatic and wetland systems in Southern
  Shelby and Johnson counties including Atterbury
  National Guard facility.
• Work with local drainage boards to install and
  utilize two stage drains and other innovative
  designs to improve the environmental
  functionality of the drainage network
• Encourage participation in landowner incentive
  programs that help fund restoration activities

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Private Landowner Incentive Programs

• Natural Resource and Conservation Service
  Programs
• Wetland Reserve Program
• Farm and Ranch Land Protection Program
• Wildlife Habitat Incentive Program
• Conservation Reserve Program

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Implementation Quilt Key Themes

• Increase Support for Green Infrastructure
• Hold an annual meeting of the Leadership Forum to
  focus on implementation of the green
  infrastructure network
• Distribute the GI network to all municipalities,
  counties and relevant state and federal agencies
• Collaborate with INDOT on using the GI network in
  transportation planning and with enhancement
  projects
• Lobby on behalf of increased state and local
  funding for land conservation and restoration,
  including using State Revolving Fund for
  acquisition, increasing funding for the Indiana
  Heritage Trust, and the restoration of the
  Hometown Indiana Grant Program.
• Work with county officials to consider the use of
  the innkeepers tax for land conservation

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Grant Programs and Foundations

• Encourage state, regional and local funding
  organizations to use the GI network to help
  prioritize their funding allocation decisions.
• State Support
• Indiana Heritage Trust
• Foundations
• Community Foundations
• Foundation with geographic interest in Indiana
• National/Regional Foundations with an interest in
  Conservation

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Grassroots

• Volunteer Support
• AmeriCorp
• Student Conservation Corp.
• (interns US forest Service and field crews)
• Friends of National Forest

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Local Level

• Use GI Network when
• Updating Plans
• Comprehensive Plans
• Parks and Recreation Plans
• Hazard Mitigation Plans
• Grey Infrastructure Plans

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Brainstorming Panels

• Four brainstorming Panels
• Pick one of four panels to attend
• Each panelist will give a short talk about a
  relevant program or strategy
• Use the remaining time to exchange ideas on how
  to implement the Central Indiana GI Network
• Provided with list of the goals, some
  implementation ideas and indicators to help guide
  your thinking
• We need your expertise, insight and courage!
• Lunch at Noon, Closing remarks

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Goal Conserve Significant Contiguous Natural
Habitat

• Implementation Quilt Opportunities
• Work with Bradford Woods and surrounding
  landowners on the conservation of significant
  contiguous blocks of forest lands
• Expand Forest Legacy focus area beyond Hurricane
  Hills tract in Southern Morgan County
• YOUR IDEAS HERE!
• Indicators
• Increase the number of acres of land protected in
  fee acquisition and the use of conservation
  easements within core areas, hubs and corridors.
• Increase in viable populations of federal and
  state listed species.
• Division of Forestry at IN DNR achieves the goal
  of conserving 100,000 acres of forest land by
  2016.
• Increase the number of rivers and streams that
  support a healthy aquatic ecosystem according to
  US EPA
• YOUR IDEAS HERE!

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Goal Increase Public Support for GI

• Implementation Quilt Opportunities
• Lobby on behalf of increased state and local
  funding for land conservation and restoration,
  including using State Revolving Fund for
  acquisition, increasing funding for the Indiana
  Heritage Trust, and the restoration of the
  Hometown Indiana Grant Program
• Identify and work with landowners that would
  benefit from incentive programs (NRCS, IDNR, IDA)
  that promote best management practices and
  environmental restoration activities
• YOUR IDEAS HERE!
• Indicators
• Increase in public funding for land conservation
  and stewardship
• Increase in enrollment in landowner incentive
  programs promoting environmental stewardship
• Increase in voluntary landowner donations of
  conservation easements.
• Increase in private foundation support for land
  conservation and restoration activities.
• Increase in membership of nonprofit organizations
  working to achieve the GI network.
• YOUR IDEAS HERE!

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Green Infrastructure Implementation Quilt
Brainstorming Panels
Forest Interiors A Collaborative Approach Ole
Amundsen TCF, Heather Bacher Central Indiana Land
Trust, Brenda Huter IDNR, Jeff Quyle Morgan
County Water Quality and Quantity Jazmin Varela
TCF, Lori Kaplin JF New, Jill Hoffman Upper White
River Watershed Alliance, Donna Price City of
Indianapolis People, Greenways, Trails
Connections Rory Robinson National Park Service,
Steve Morris IDNR, Al Patterson Hamilton County
Working in an Agricultural Landscape Cliff
Chapman Central Indiana Land Trust, Larry Clemens
The Nature Conservancy, Becky Ross NRCS