Submitted story

The Glen Helen Raptor Center will be the keynote presentation during the Champaign Land Preservation Annual Meeting on Tuesday, July 18 at the Urbana Melvin Miller City Park bandstand stage area at 7 p.m.

Please bring lawn chairs for this free event that is open to the public.

The Glen Helen Raptor Center will be bringing some raptors for an educational demonstration.

Over the past five years, the Raptor Center has been able to release 43% of its patients for a second chance at life in the wild. Additionally, the Raptor Center’s involvement with species recovery efforts, particularly Osprey, Peregrine Falcon, and Bald Eagle, help mitigate human-wildlife conflicts. The Raptor Center assists injured or orphaned wildlife.

The Champaign Land Preservation (CLP) is a non-profit 501 (c) (3) conservation organization. It is a land trust that works to preserve farm land, open space, and wildlife habitat. CLP sponsors programs about land preservation, conservation, local foods, climate change, and natural history.

CLP is one of over 1,300 land trusts in the United States. A land trust is organized to help achieve individual and community land use and land preservation goals.

CLP works with landowners to create easement language that protects the conservation values of the owner’s property. Conservation values may include productive agricultural land, stream corridors, or woodlands.

Once these easements are recorded, they remain in place from owner to owner and protect the conservation values of the property in perpetuity. Owners continue to own their land. The owners can use their land, sell it, or pass it on to their heirs, subject to the easement.

For more information about the Champaign Land Preservation, please visit www.champaignlandpreservation.org.

Info from Tracy Mount