STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE
Planning Your Wildlife Conservation Project |
| STEP 1: Organize the Project Team |
- Find volunteers to do the work: invite local boards, other local groups and area residents to attend an initial planning meeting to brainstorm goals and objectives.
- Establish a work group of 5-7 interested people to direct the project.
- Choose a project leader/coordinator.
- Define the group's purpose: what do you want to protect and why?
- Identify the geographic project area (a town, watershed or region).
- Identify resources available to the group: people, local conservation groups, land trusts, public support, support from local officials, money, etc.
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| STEP 2: Review Available Information |
- Review the community's existing natural resources documents such as natural resources inventory, conservation plan, master plan, water resources protection plan, other natural resources studies, etc. for the study area.
- If you don't have a natural resource inventory (NRI), consider conducting one or revising an outdated NRI (see Natural Resource Inventories).
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| STEP 3: Identify Priorities for Habitat Protection |
- Using the Wildlife Action Plan Habitat Maps and other existing natural resource inventory maps available to you, identify priority areas for future habitat conservation.
- Identify landownership within these priority areas using tax maps - some towns have these digitized and available as electronic map layers.
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| STEP 4: Develop a Work Plan |
- Identify 1-3 projects that your group can feasibly accomplish with a one-year time frame. Read about projects other towns in NH have undertaken in Community Stories.
- For each project, identify the actions needed to accomplish that project (see Community Actions).
- Assign work team members to tasks.
- Track progress on the work plan regularly and modify the plan as needed.
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| STEP 5: Develop a Budget |
- Develop a budget for the work plan, and identify potential funding sources.
- Estimate the scope of the project: for a land conservation campaign, for example, how many acres. to protect per year is your goal and how much might it cost per year, per project, and in total?
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| STEP 6: Publicity and Outreach |
- See Public Outreach and Wildlife Habitat .
- Keep the community informed. Host displays at public events, run articles in the local paper, keep a blog on the town website, or otherwise contribute to local sources of news and information.
- Engage in education and outreach to landowners, voters and municipal officials.
- Publicize your accomplishments. Let the community know about what is happening.
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