Easement Monitoring

The conservation easement has been signed, notarized and recorded, so what happens next? Placing a conservation easement on your property is a tremendous gift; not only are you protecting your property in perpetuity, but you are also contributing to the protection of Virginia’s open spaces for future generations to appreciate. In order to ensure that the conservation values agreed to in your conservation easement remain intact, VOF continues its end of this partnership by conducting monitoring visits to your property every few years. These visits become especially important if you should sell or subdivide your property, as new landowners may be unfamiliar with conservation easements. These visits provide VOF with an opportunity to assist landowners with the continued protection of the conservation values of your easement.

What's Involved?

Prior to easement recordation, a Baseline Documentation Report will be created which documents the condition of your land at the time the easement is placed.  After easement recordation, VOF will then schedule visits on a regular basis in order to monitor the conservation easement.  The Baseline Documentation Report provides a reference for all future monitoring visits.

Before a visit is conducted, a stewardship staff person will contact you via letter or phone in order to arrange a visit. Although it is not necessary for the landowner to be present, we try our best to coordinate a time that is convenient for you should any questions arise during the visit. Landowner presence greatly assists VOF as well, since you are often the best tour guide when it comes to walking your property. We also hope these visits provide you with a contact at VOF should you ever have questions or concerns regarding your easement.

The Visit

Once you have been contacted by VOF, and a date is set, here is some general information on what you can expect on the day of the visit. If you will be joining us on the site visit, we simply need to take a tour of your property, seeing as much of the property as possible.  We are especially interested in any changes that have occurred on the property since the last visit.  As we tour the property we will ask some general questions about your property, which may include the following:

1. Any changes to the property since the last visit?
2. Any new buildings or structures?
3. Are there any future planned changes for the property?
4. Any intention on selling or dividing the property?
5. Do you have any questions or concerns regarding your easement?

We will also “document” the property as we tour. Documentation typically involves the following:

• Photographs with compass readings (photos can be of buildings, structures, or views of the property, natural features, etc.);
• Global Positioning Satellite (GPS) data, this device takes a reading of where the monitor was standing when the photograph was taken, and can be displayed later on a map in the monitoring report;
• Notes and comments of what we are photographing and any comments from you on recent changes or concerns about your property.

The Report

After the visit is conducted VOF returns to the office and begins downloading the data for your monitoring report. We gather the photographs, notes and GPS data and produce a report with maps and photos included. We will send a copy of all of this information to you for review and approval. If there are any changes or corrections needed, please contact us immediately and we will make the appropriate changes.

VOF looks at conservation easements as partnerships with our landowners – landowners who took the extra step to preserve a beautiful piece of Virginia. We know every easement is a precious gift to be treasured by all, and we look forward to working with you to protect these gifts.