Alex Few

The pace of new subdivisions being requested in Park County has been increasing since 2020, when the Covid pandemic inspired people to move to the region in droves. 

For some, the influx of new residents is an opportunity to profit from development. Agricultural land is already flat and ready for construction while many families are cash poor but land rich. And with about two of three college graduates leaving the state permanently, farms and ranches are being sold off because new generations aren’t always interested in a career in agriculture. For others, the trend is alarming as open land — an important resource for wildlife and a move away from the heritage of farming and ranching that buoys the county’s ag sector — is being divvied up.

Arthur Middleton, a professor of environmental science, policy and management at the University of California, Berkeley, who has studied the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem for 17 years, wrote a recent guest opinion in The New York Times lamenting development, linking some of the recent population influx to the Paramount show, “Yellowstone.”

“The show, which returns to Paramount on Sunday for the second half of its fifth season, made owning a piece of this landscape glamorous around the same time the pandemic and remote work drove more people to do so,” he wrote.

Home values in Bozeman,  Jackson, and Cody have shot up since 2018. One study published after the fourth season of “Yellowstone” found that close to two-thirds of tourists reported that their visit to Montana was at least partly inspired by the show. While there is no data explicitly linking the television show to development, it only takes a small number of new homes in each valley near Yellowstone to change its future, Middleton said.

“I see mounting development as a grave threat because of how it is carving up an ecosystem that must stay relatively intact to function,” he said.

Now the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is weighing in on the issue with fat checks to lift organizations concerned with saving habitat connectivity and supporting the region’s agricultural economy. The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem is home to abundant wildlife populations and a vibrant agricultural community of farms and ranches. These private lands are under threat of development as farms and ranches are parceled off to meet the demands of a growing population.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has awarded more than $21 million from a pot of $1.5 billion to partner-driven conservation projects, including three organizations in Wyoming. The funding marks a significant step forward in safeguarding critical open spaces in Northwest Wyoming. This five-year initiative, led by the Jackson Hole Land Trust in partnership with Grand Teton National Park, Wind River Tribal Buffalo Initiative, Wyoming Game and Fish Department and the Wyoming Stock Growers Land Trust, aims to protect up to 20,000 acres of private lands, including vital wildlife corridors, cultural resources, and working farms and ranches, according to a press release by the Jackson trust. The plan allows landowners to retain private ownership while saving open lands in perpetuity.

The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem is home to abundant wildlife populations and home to a vibrant agricultural community of farms and ranches. These private lands are under threat of development as farms and ranches are parceled off to meet the demands of a growing population. The primary goal of the Land Trust project is to protect and enhance the critical lands in northwest Wyoming that sequester carbon, support the region’s iconic ungulate species, and support the agricultural economies in the area.

“Farmers and ranchers are the backbone of conservation in this region,” said Alex Few, director of Park County Open Lands, a regional program of the Jackson trust. “This award gives us the opportunity to work hand-in-hand with local producers to protect these lands and our local agricultural and tourism economies.”

The USDA also awarded $14 million to the Salt River Watershed Restoration Project and more than $21 million to the Tribal Buffalo Restoration in the Northern Great Plains Region.

The Salt River Watershed Restoration Project, led by the Jackson trust, will help to restore aquatic and riparian habitat, reduce stream bank erosion, restore habitat connectivity, and sequester carbon in the Salt River and its tributaries through stream restoration, grazing management, and agricultural infrastructure. The Tribal Buffalo Restoration in the Northern Great Plains Region, which will work to restore and manage native grasslands ecosystems utilizing buffalo and conservation practices on lands within 21-member tribal nations in South Dakota, Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming.

“Private working lands are essential to maintaining open space for our wildlife populations,” said Jill Randall, Wyoming Game and Fish Department big game migration coordinator. “Partnerships like these between federal, state, Tribal, and private lands are essential to keeping Wyoming’s landscapes functioning for wildlife who understand nothing about whose land they are standing on. This RCPP award is an exciting opportunity for private landowners to be a huge part of the forward progress towards this goal.”

The funding will put a lot of money directly in the hands of local landowners, Few said.

“The vast majority of that $21.25 million will go back to landowners’ hands for purchasing conservation easements,” Few said in an interview with the Tribune. “We'll share those funds with Wyoming Stock Growers Land Trust, but they'll all be directed to the Jackson Hole Land Trust service area across northwest Wyoming.”

The service area includes Sublette, Fremont, Park and Teton counties. Yet, Park County is woefully behind other counties with only 5.6% of the private land permanently protected by easements. Meanwhile, about 25% of other county landowners have chosen to protect their heritage.

“Farms in Park County are still largely family owned and operated. The family farm is thriving here,” Few said. “Recognizing how important the farming lands here are for the future of food security in our region is actually really important.”

The funds are in addition to annual funding provided by the USDA through the Natural Resources Conservation Service. The NRCS typically allocates funds to two different pots: Wyoming conservation easements and big game habitat protection. The funds vary from year to year, but is usually between $7 to $10 million. For the first time in more than a decade, in 2023 the NRCS received more requests for conservation easements than they had funds to award.

The funding is made available through the Farm Bill and the Inflation Reduction Act. The Inflation Reduction Act is part of the federal government’s Investing in America Agenda, the largest investment in climate action and conservation in U.S. history. The funds have enabled the NRCS to boost funding for the Regional Conservation Partnership Program, which promotes coordination for conservation activities with partners that offer value-added contributions to expand our collective ability to address on-farm, watershed, and regional natural resource concerns.. In total, the Inflation Reduction Act provides $19.5 billion to support USDA’s oversubscribed conservation programs, including $4.95 billion for regional conservation partnerships.

Partnership projects support priorities in conservation and climate and can save farmers money and increase productivity. For example, there are 16 projects that address water conservation in the West, ensuring producers and communities have the tools they need to adapt in the face of continued drought pressures. And 42 projects promote terrestrial wildlife habitat conservation and restoration, as directed by the recent USDA Secretarial memo: Conserving and Restoring Terrestrial Wildlife Habitat Connectivity and Corridors. 

Few said developing easements is time-sensitive and it’s important to act quickly.

“Within agriculture, the vast majority of landowners are at retirement age, if not beyond retirement age. So, in the next five to 10 years there will be a significant transition in land ownership. A conservation easement gives a working farm and ranch family an opportunity to fund retirement for the exiting generation and lower land values for the entering generation to allow that transition to be less painful,” she said.