During the summer, staff of the accredited Conservation Trust for North Carolina visited the small town of Princeville that has been repeatedly devastated by floodwaters. In 1999, Hurricane Floyd caused the Tar River to rise and the town was submerged.

Standing atop Burnt Mountain, a great arc of the northern Green Mountains embraces you in soft-shouldered beauty stretching from horizon to horizon. Up close, the vivid colors of the fall foliage surround you.

Tucked away in the Winter 1989 issue of Exchange, the original quarterly journal of the Land Trust Alliance, is an announcement highlighting the launch of a groundbreaking new project: Land Trust Standards and Practices.

Each year, the Maryland Environmental Trust and its state partners award more than $200,000 in grants to other land trusts and community organizations in the state through its Keep Maryland Beautiful program. It’s a meaningful program with many success stories.

Land trusts around the country continue to explore the use of renewable energy, including solar. At the accredited Land Trust of Napa County in California, solar panel installations equal big cost savings.

In New Mexico, the accredited Taos Land Trust is flipping the switch on the energy debate and building community energy resiliency. Solar panels generate 50% of the energy used to run the land trust.

How often do you wake up on the wrong side of the bed, feeling anxious or cranky?

I was fortunate to join the staff of the Land Trust Alliance (then the Land Trust Exchange) for the first time in the summer of 1987. I was 27 — a millennial, in today's terms — young and eager to make my mark.

It's official: Last month was the Earth's hottest month on record.

Certain projects really resonate, demonstrating how our work encompasses just about every value I hold dear: environmental and wildlife habitat preservation and restoration, family land and open space conservation, and some days, even social justice.