Twelvemile VAlley The Twelvemile Ranch on County Road 5 southwest of Fairplay will have 840 acres placed in a conservation easement. Colorado Open Lands will manage the easement. The ranch contains water rights and extreme rich fens and alkali salt flats. On Oct. 13, Park County commissioners approved $29,500 from the Land and Water Trust Fund (funded by a 1 percent county sales tax) to help pay the costs of preparing the conservation easement. (Photo by Gary Nichols/courtesy of Colorado Open Lands)

Lynda James
Correspondent

Park County's Board of County Commissioners signed an agreement on Oct. 13 with Colorado Open Lands that will protect $3 million worth of land from development.

Transaction costs for two conservation easements and a sediment assessment of the North Fork of the South Platte watershed were addressed in the agreement.

Colorado Open Lands Director of Conservation Operations Dieter Erdmann presented the three projects to the county commissioners.

Erdmann also said that Colorado Open Lands has more than 20,000 acres of conservation easements in Park County worth tens of millions of dollars. He is working on a summary of the preservation impact Colorado Open Lands has had in the county.

Deer Valley Park

One of the few working cattle ranches in Platte Canyon, the Deer Valley Park Association Ranch, is putting a conservation easement on 719 acres.

The ranch is located between Rosalie Road and Roland Valley Road on the southeast side of U.S. 285.

The Deer Valley Park Association Ranch was established in 1883 and has been operated by the association since. It was recognized as a Colorado Centennial Ranch in 1986. Six cabins are on the property and the association will reserve the right in the conservation easement to build more. The association currently consists of eighteen shareholders.

Three miles of Deer Creek run through the ranch. The agricultural water rights date to the 1860s and 1870s.

A Great Outdoors Colorado grant application is being prepared to fund the conservation easement, valued at $2 million. Costs for the preparation are estimated to total $30,000. The costs will be equally paid by the Deer Park Valley Association and the Park County Land and Water Trust Fund (which is funded by a county sales tax of 1 percent).

Twelvemile Ranch

A conservation easement on the Twelvemile Ranch will preserve 840 acres from development. The easement is being donated to Colorado Open Lands and the land value of that 840 acres is estimated at $1 million.

Two miles of Twelvemile Creek and Sheep Creek run through the property, which is located west of U.S. 285, a few miles south of Fairplay on County Road 5.

The property also includes extremely rich fens (rare wetlands due to the chemical composition of the groundwater that feeds them) and alkali salt flats. Colorado Open Lands expects rare species are on the property.

The ranch is owned by the Twelvemile Ranch Co., which has 18 members. The company is a nonprofit that was formed following World War I.

The company owns 1880s water rights on both Twelvemile and Sheep creeks.

Fifteen cabins exist on the property. The company is reserving building sites for three more cabins so that each member will own a cabin.

As a nonprofit, the company cannot receive tax benefits from placing land into a conservation easement.

In order that the company can receive some benefit, the $36,439 in transaction costs will be paid by two groups.

The Land and Water Trust Fund is contributing $29,500, and the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Habitat Partnership Program is contributing $6,939.