For years, Mike Snyder has been working to try to create viable land management solutions for Vermonters that balance conservation and smart growth principles. In his role as the Commissioner at the Vermont Agency of Natural Resources in the Department of Forests Parks and Recreation from 2011 to 2023, he applied his knowledge of forest ecology to help Vermont build a sustainable future for communities and natural environments in the Green Mountain State. Since transitioning away from his state work, Snyder has continued to create strategic planning solutions for the Vermont landscape as consultant for his business Greenfire Enterprises.
As a part of his recent consulting work, he joined forces with VNRC staff and other partners to draft a manual for Vermont landowners looking for more education on options for conserving property. We spoke with Snyder this fall to hear more about his land management ethos, the importance he sees in a diverse approach to land conservation, and how he thinks his newly collaboratively authored publication The Landowner Guide will move the needle for more strategic land management planning in Vermont.
Louise Lintilhac: How do you see protecting Vermont’s working lands and natural landscapes, forests and wildlife areas as being a part of the bigger picture of creating sustainable growth in the state of Vermont, i.e. how do you balance conservation and smart growth?
Mike Snyder: To me, they’re not distinct—well, in some ways they are, sure—you’ve got conservation and you’ve got smart growth. But I see it all connected as land use. Whether it’s to develop housing or livable communities, or to protect working and natural lands – they all would work better if we all had a higher level of environmental ecological literacy and an ethic of stewardship informing our approach to land use. We are part of the environment, not apart from it. That’s probably my main philosophy. So, I think they’re connected because you can’t have one without the other.
I often explain this by using another bit of land use legislation that preceded Act 181, which was Act 59. Act 59 is the 30×30 and 50×50 law that requires that Vermont permanently conserve 30% of the landscape by 2030 and 50% of the landscape by 2050. And my point here is that as excited as I am about that goal, and as hard as I’ve worked to help make it happen, I firmly believe that even if we’re successful in protecting 30% of the landscape by 2030 or 50% by 2050, if we don’t have a plan for the other 70% or the other 50%, then those protected lands will in fact be threatened. Maybe they’re not threatened from development, but they’re threatened ecologically because we’re not having a holistic, comprehensive view of the landscape, if we let the fate of the remaining 70 or 50 % be determined without that stewardship ethic.
So that’s where Vermont Conservation Design comes into play. The goal is an ecologically functional and connected landscape, which includes built environments, livable communities, connective areas to wild and working lands—having a magic mix of it all. I think that’s in part what Act 181 is trying to do, it helps plan for how we permit and regulate development while also keeping intact these working and ecologically functional lands, because without them, we don’t have livable communities. We don’t have the long-term viability and sustainability we need.
LL: I am interested in your thoughts on how you see conservation of private land playing into this bigger strategy of developing these areas, both for smart growth and then also setting aside land for conservation more deliberately.
MS: Jamey Fidel has certainly heard me say this a lot, as well as others at VNRC for some time—when I look at conservation, I see “Big C” conservation and “Little C” conservation. This isn’t my idea, I learned it from others before me. The idea is that Big C conservation is the total toolkit. Little C conservation is just one of the tools in the toolkit of concert of big C conservation. Little C is the legal protection through conservation easements, or purchase and extinguishing of development rights. A lot of times in conversations, we conflate these two approaches to conservation and it implies that the only kind of conservation is permanent protection. Permanent protection is actually most often an outcome of a long-developed conservation education and experience.
The most common perception of conservation is what happens at a land trust. I’m a big supporter of that method, but I don’t think it’s enough. Vermont has led with land trust conservation and it’s a big part of these programs and policies that we’re talking about, but I’m even more excited by what I call Big C conservation, which is the entire toolbox that ranges from Little C projects with legal constraints to current use and working lands through exemplary forestry practice, water quality enhancements and protections, habitat enhancements and protections, the range of activities that landowners engage in to connect with their land that permanently protects it, to more of an engagement on the land in an intelligent and local way that’s ecologically based.
That’s the challenge: policies need to be discreet and a one-size-fits-all while the natural environment doesn’t really work that way, so we have to find a more comprehensive approach – that Big C approach. And I think if we put all these aspects together, we get Act 59—permanent protection through legal means. Act 181 is more planning and permitting of development, as well as where and how to mitigate impacts of development on natural areas and that’s the total package. That to me, especially when it supports private landowners having a range of stewardship options for their land and long-term thinking about keeping the land as forest land in this particular case, that’s what we need.
The goal is to create healthy lands, a healthy environment, healthy communities, and an ecologically functional, intact connected landscape—all of that is good for the economy. It is good for human health and community vitality. And that’s the secret sauce. We’re so lucky here in Vermont that we actually still have a chance to get all this right. Honestly this part of the conversation about Big C and Little C conservation is about seeing the bigger picture and not getting stuck in individual silos of policy.
LL: So what are some tools that people can use to start engaging with conservation strategies here in Vermont?
MS: The idea for the landowner guide is to empower Vermonters, particularly forest landowners, to be stewards, regardless of their personal goals. Some folks will have a goal of Little C conservation. They want to put an easement on their land, they want to make sure it stays that way as undeveloped.
Others are not interested in that. Or maybe just not yet. But they do want to work with their forest land for enhanced recreational access or to connect to other recreational lands or to seek economic activity through forest products, or they want to enhance habitat, or rehabilitate degraded places. There’s an enormous range of desires that folks have for their land. I’ve worked nearly 40 years with landowners in Vermont, and I can attest there’s quite a range of philosophies, flavors of management,and ownership goals.
That’s what I love about the approach that this group led by VNRC has taken with the Forest Landowner Outreach Project and particularly developing the stewardship guide for forest landowners that’s intended to be an available resource to empower that stewardship ethic, regardless of any personal philosophies of ownership and management.
The Landowner guide is designed in a way where there’s something in there for everybody and it’s modular in the sense that you don’t need to think about doing everything on every acre every year. It’s a choose-your-own-adventure situation, that’s what Jamey Fidel used to say. The premise is when people are engaged with their land, good decisions tend to happen. And long-term benefits to the land come from it.