The Fund provides lifetime income and permanent protection for donors’ lands
Writing by NEFF Conservation Project Manager Sophie Anthony and NEFF Communications Manager Tinsley Hunsdorfer
Mr. Robert Boone and his wife, Susan L. Boone, have joined the New England Forestry Foundation’s unique Pooled Timber Income Fund (PTIF). They generously donated a 78-acre forestland in Whately, Mass., to New England Forestry Foundation (NEFF), and the forestland’s timber to the PTIF. Now called the Robert Boone and Susan L. Boone Forest, the property and its stream, wetlands, beautiful woods and rolling hills have become part of NEFF’s network of more than 150 Community Forests. It brings the total acreage donated to NEFF through the PTIF to 1,740.
A wetland area in the Robert Boone and Susan L. Boone Forest, one of the properties many appealing features. Photo by Charlie Reinertsen
“Mr. and Mrs. Boone’s gift of their beautiful Whately forestland and its timber will help to grow the Pooled Timber Income Fund and spread Exemplary Forest management throughout New England, all while ensuring protection for the property and providing the Boones with an upfront tax deduction and a steady annual income,” said Sophie Anthony, NEFF Conservation Project Manager. “We are excited to see this unique Fund continue to expand thanks to conservation-minded landowners like Mr. and Mrs. Boone, and are excited to welcome nearby community members to come and explore the Boone Forest.”
When PTIF participants donate their woodlands to the New England Forestry Foundation, the woodlands’ timber is contributed to a pooled income fund trust that manages the timber in accord with NEFF’s green-certified, Exemplary Forestry practices. In turn, donors ensure permanent protection for their land, and receive a steady annual income and an initial charitable tax deduction. On the death of the beneficiaries, the timber reverts to NEFF, and NEFF has the option to keep the timber in the PTIF or to unite it with the land to become a traditional NEFF Community Forest.
“It has always been our desire to save our timberland from being developed, and New England Forestry Foundation has provided us with its Pooled Timber Income Fund as a way to accomplish this,” said the Boones. “It was important to us that not only will the timberland be managed, but it will also be harvested in a sustainable way for the future.”
The PTIF is a great tool to help spread the practice of Exemplary Forestry, NEFF’s in-house forest management approach that prioritizes forests’ long-term health and outlines the highest standards of sustainability currently available to New England landowners for climate change mitigation, wildlife habitat and biodiversity, and growing and harvesting more sustainably produced wood. The PTIF also helps advance land conservation, and protecting the Robert Boone and Susan L. Boone Forest’s 78 acres is another step forward in the journey to keep 70 percent of New England forested and free from development, as described in Harvard Forest and Highstead’s Wildlands and Woodlands vision, and in keeping with NEFF’s goal to see no net loss of regional forestlands over the next 30 years, a part of NEFF’s 30 Percent Solution.
Learn more about the Pooled Timber Income Fund.
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Top banner photo: The Robert Boone and Susan L. Boone Forest in Whately, now one of New England Forestry Foundation’s more than 150 Community Forests. Photo by Charlie Reinertsen.