New U.S. law sets up land trust

Bush tax plan boosts conservation easements

Washington - AP - One of the nation’s frequently used tools for protecting land from development is being expanded under a provision of the tax law President Bush signed last week.

People can now donate conservation easements anywhere in the United States to a land trust or government agency after their death and qualify for an estate tax benefit.

The tax law eliminates a requirement that a qualifying conservation easement be within 25 miles of a metropolitan area, national park or wilderness area or within 10 miles of a national forest that is near a big city.

That requirement had left ineligible much of rural America, including areas of the Great Plains and parts of 44 states such as northern Maine and north-central Pennsylvania.

Interior Secretary Gale Norton, the nation’s chief steward of public lands, said Friday the new law “helps more families contribute a legacy of conservation and environmental protection that will live on for generations.”

Helen Hooper, congressional affairs director for The Nature Conservancy, said the new provisions would make a big difference.

“People who are going to pay an estate tax will now have an incentive to put a conservation easement on their land,” she said.  “It’ll be a good incentive for people who are elderly.”  

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