• State Funding for Conservation Projects in Chatham County (aka "Green Book" data)
• Example of conservation projects in Chatham County funded with state trust fund money:
  In 1995, a farm in the heart of the Sutphin Mill farming community on the Chatham-Alamance County line went on the market. Land prices had been rising fast enough in this community located halfway between the Triad and the Triangle that no farmer could afford to buy it. Other farmers were very concerned about the effect a housing development might have on their own ability to farm. They knew they needed a group of farms together to keep other associated businesses, such as feed and tractor stores, profitable. They also worried that new neighbors might complain about farm practices like pesticide use and slow moving machinery on the roads. They turned to the Piedmont Land Conservancy and American Farmland Trust to help them find a solution. By piecing together funding from a variety of sources, the Piedmont Land Conservancy was able to purchase the farm at fair market value, place permanent restrictions within the deed on any future non-agricultural development on the farm, and then resell it at its farm value to a farmer. This project was so successful that four other Sutphin Mill farmers have since entered into similar agreements, and more than 500 acres of farmland have now been permanently protected. Learn more about Sutphin Mill on the PLC website.

         The Deep River - A Rare And Shining Place 

• With only five known populations, the two-inch-long Cape Fear shiner is a rare fish. This little shiner with a broad black racing stripe down its sides is the “canary in the coalmine” of the upper Cape Fear River: water that is clean enough for the shiner is clean enough for people as well.
  
  Protecting water for the Cape Fear shiner and for people is just one of many reasons the NC Division
  of Parks and Recreation is recommending that a new state park be established on the Deep River in
  Chatham and Lee counties. The river is also brimming with other great things – abundant wildlife, fascinating human history, and some of the best fl atwater canoeing in the Piedmont.
  
  Triangle Land Conservancy has been helping piece together that envisioned state park for many years, and several state grants in 2006 have helped bring the total acres protected to date up to 2,450. Two of those grants, totaling $655,000 from the Clean Water Management Trust Fund, added 113 acres to the 275-acre White Pines Nature Preserve, a place where mountain species like white pines, mountain laurel, and Catawba rhododendron have been growing since the last ice age.
  
  About 2.5 miles downstream from White Pines, another Clean Water Management Trust Fund grant
  for $315,000 and a Natural Heritage Trust Fund grant for $234,300 added 75 acres and two miles of streams to the 870-acre Justice Lands Natural Area. This land will become a popular area in a future park because of its beautiful forests and its location near Jordan Lake.