permaculture

[Sean Maley <semaley@yahoo.com>]

Green Phoenix Permaculture has been exploring this, too.  Conceptually this 
seems like a great fit, as a land trust helps factor out speculation.  Our 
weakness has been finding adequate legal guidance to help put all the details 
together in a PC compatible way.  First, there are different kinds of land 
trusts other than for conservation (we have mostly targeted Community Land 
Trust 
options).  Some wealthy land owners have used the Conservation concept to 
lock 
up land, so they keep their scenic views and higher land values.  Others use 
it 
to reduce the value of their land and hence tax burden (both capital losses 
and 
assessment value).  The IRS now looks very closely at these things, so legal 
assistance is highly recommended.  Unfortunately, Lawyers seem to specialize 
in 
very specific legal areas, so mixing and matching legal fields seams to cause 
trouble when your design encompasses too many fields (which it probably 
should).

With that said, I'm sure there is a lawyer somewhere who is 
willing to do the research.  So far, I have been quoted $5000 (research 
retainer, not final price) to do the research just mixing PC education, a 
regional CLT, and cottage industry/farmer market style fund raising to keep 
it 
going.  We have a pro-bono lawyer still on the case (first one stone walled 
us 
for a year, current lawyer waiting for us to provide revised by-laws 
simplifying 
us into one category: Education), but he isn't familiar with Permaculture 
concepts (as far as I can tell).  It isn't like we want to evade taxes or get 
rich, we just want to save the world by promoting a culture based upon deep 
ecology concepts ("we are a part of Earth", not it's "Steward" holding 
dominion 
over all life and death).

I can provide the model details, if anyone is 
interested in exploring this.  My personal thought being that permanent 
culture 
starts with caring for land (represented as a Trust), which allows the land 
and 
people to care for one another, then sharing resources to help secure more 
land 
for a robust network of permanent culture.  My opinion on Kevin's situation 
is 
that there was no established financial model ready to address a priori 
expenses.

To the uninitiated, we sound like crackpots playing lawyer (hard to argue 
the truth).  We are essentially an inverted business model.  Where businesses 
usually try to invest outwardly plotting market share (spoil profits of 
competitors and increase your own; exclusionary by being destructive), we 
focus 
on investing inwardly including others, then shoot off pioneers to repair 
more 
land to include more people (inclusive by being constructive).  The existing 
Corporate and Land Trust structures don't address this conundrum 
well.


-Sean.


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