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Chapter Three

Private Preservation Initiatives
(from Grassroots Historic Preservation, Written by Anita P. Miller, Attorney at Law, for the New Mexico Historic Preservation Division)

As summarized by the State Historic Preservation Officer recently in the Albuquerque Tribune, "historic places get preserved because people care about them." Although one person can make a difference, the political process responds better to organized efforts to achieve goals. If you are serious about preservation, examine your opportunities and seek out friends, neighbors and community leaders whose names carry weight. Their support will speed planning for historic preservation, development of historic and archeological preservation ordinances, and adoption of appropriate land use regulations that may include historic preservation districts and overlay districts and crusades to accomplish identified preservation projects.

Preservation Associations
Private historic preservation entities are organized as 501(c)(3) or 502 (c)(4) corporations and are exempt from payment of federal income taxes. They are organized exclusively for religious, charitable, scientific, and other "public benefit" educational purposes and are an essential element in historic preservation. These organizations cannot try to influence legislation nor can they be involved in political campaigns. They can, however, (a) inform and educate their communities about buildings, structures, objects, sites and districts that are archaeologically, historically and culturally significant, and (b) spearhead registration of historic districts and properties and develop design guidelines.

Historic preservation organizations should have officers and a board of directors to set goals, policies plans and programs. If possible, they should be salaried. Incorporation is desirable to avoid the possible liability of officers and members.

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Historic preservation organizations can undertake projects such as:

  • writing a series of newspaper articles describing the history and architecture of significant structures, sites and places in the community or region
  • publishing a newsletter containing items on preservation projects in the community, letters to the editor about preservation issues, and articles about opportunities for preservation or threats to historic resources
  • preparing educational programs for local schools
  • coordinating public events, e.g., awards ceremonies honoring people active in preservation, re-enactments of historic events, or living history presentations that educate the public about local or regional history
  • conducting tours of historically significant sites and places
  • preparing brochures about historic sites and places
  • presenting workshops on preservation law and preservation techniques
  • organizing a visiting lecturer series
These organizations may also assist the HPD and local governments in performing the actual historic surveys required for listing on the State and National registers. Other community service projects include collecting and distributing reference materials, and creating resources, for example:
  • a preservation reference section in your local library
  • a conservation easement program
  • a revolving fund for preservation. Repayment of these loans provides funding for future projects.
  • a list of architects, contractors, painters, etc., skilled in preservation
Roswell
In Roswell, the Historic Preservation Committee of the Historical Center for SE NM created the Downtown Historic District and prepared nomination applications to the State Register of Cultural Properties for the District and 295 contributing and 97 non-contributing buildings within it. The Committee has also nominated rural properties outside the city and developed design guidelines for district properties

The Committee has been the driving force in the drafting of a Historic Overlay Zone Ordinance for the City of Roswell to apply to the District, which would include the design guidelines already developed. Even if the City ultimately does not adopt the ordinance, the Historic District will continue to exist, and private property owners within it may reap the benefits of listing. Contact: Historic Preservation Committee, Historical Center of SE NM (200 North Lea Avenue Roswell, NM 88201).

The New Mexico Route 66 Association, dedicated to the restoration and promotion of Route 66, is planning major events to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the construction of the route.
  • "Lincoln Days," sponsored by the Lincoln County Historic Society, celebrates historic events in the Village of Lincoln connected with Billy the Kid.
  • El Rancho de las Golondrinas, a living history museum owned by a private nonprofit association, is open to the public. Volunteer members dress in costume and portray people living and working in an agricultural community in colonial NM.

    Conservation easements, land trusts and water banking
    Conservation easements, land trusts and water banking may be used by private associations to achieve preservation of historic properties and acequias. Conservation easements were discussed briefly in Chapter 2 in relation to archaeological sites. In New Mexico, unlike in other states, the state and local governments are not authorized by statute to hold conservation easements. They may be held by qualified private associations, however.

    Conservation Easements
    A conservation easement is a legal agreement in which a property owner voluntarily restricts the type and amount of development that may take place on the property. Each easement's restrictions are tailored to the particular property and to the interests of the individual owner. The NM Cultural Properties Preservation Easement Act (NMSA 1978, Sections 47-12A-2 to 47-12A-6) defines a cultural properties preservation easement, as "preserving the historical, architectural, archaeological or cultural significance of real property."

    To understand the easement concept, think of owning land as a "bundle of sticks." A landowner may sell or give away the whole bundle, or just one or two of the sticks or rights. Those conveyed may include the right to construct buildings or to restrict access. A property owner may donate or sell certain sticks or rights while retaining others, by granting an easement to an appropriate third party, known as the "holder" of the easement. The specific rights given up by a property owner when granting a conservation easement are spelled out in each easement document.

    A historic preservation easement may be used to protect the facade and surroundings of a historic structure listed as eligible for listing in the National Register. It may be used to protect an archaeological site on private property from future subdivision and development, or used to preserve a Civil War battlefield as open space, free of modern structures.

    The NM Cultural Properties Preservation Easement Act provides for the creation of easements for the purpose of protection of "structures, places, sites or objects having historical, archaeological, scientific, architectural or other cultural significance." Only qualified Section 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporations, nonprofit associations and nonprofit trusts may hold these easements.

    Q. Why should I donate a conservation easement for historic preservation?What are the financial benefits of cultural preservation easements?

    Federal Tax Benefits
    A historic property owner can benefit from conveying a limitation on the use of property and then continuing to use it as before. The owner may claim a federal income tax credit on the difference in value between the property as it is and the highest and best use of the property as determined by an appraiser, with the approval of the Internal Revenue Service. Federal tax law also encourages the donation of preservation easements by permitting charitable deductions for such donations, under Section 170(h)(1)(A) of the Internal Revenue Code.

    Estate Tax Benefit
    The donation of a conservation easement for historic preservation will allow the property to be taxed for estate tax purposes on the basis of its restricted use, rather than its "highest and best use," which may be in more intensive development. Many historic NM properties have been lost because, after the death of a family member, the heirs could not afford to pay an estate tax based on the highest and best use of the property. A conservation easement enables the tax to be assessed on the current use as restricted, allowing the family to retain the property. Even if a property owner does not want to restrict the property during his or her lifetime, the owner can still specify in his or her will that a charitable gift of a conservation easement be made to a qualifying organization upon the owner's death.

    Local Property Tax Benefit

    Property tax assessment is usually based on market value, which reflects the development potential of the property. If a conservation easement reduces the development potential of the property, it may reduce the level of assessment. The actual amount of reduction, if any, depends on many factors, however. State law and the personal attitudes of local officials and assessors may influence or determine the decision to award property tax relief to easement grantors.

    Q. What are the obligations of easement holders and grantors?

    The 501(c)(3) organization that accepts a preservation easement also accepts affirmative responsibilities, such as the duty to enforce any restrictive clauses in the easement document. For example, the organization may have the duty to review and approve proposed alterations (usually exterior) to a historic structure, or to review and approve any development on a historic or archaeological site, or the responsibility to inspect a property periodically to ensure that the terms of the easement are being met. The property owner may be required to record the easement, to insert the easement in a subsequent deed, to meet certain insurance requirements, or to give the preservation entity that holds the easement a right of first refusal before selling the property.
    Qualified Easement Holders
    The only preservation association currently the holder of a cultural properties easement pursuant to the Cultural Properties Preservation Easement Act is the Historic Santa Fe Foundation, which holds an easement to the Original Trad_ing Post (201 W. San Francisco Street, Santa Fe, NM 87501). Contact the Historic Santa Fe Foundation (545 Canyon Rd., Santa Fe, NM 87501; (505) 983-2567).

    Other organizations hold conservation easements in order to preserve "natural or open space values of real property, assuring the availability of real property for agricultural, forest, recreational or open space use, or protecting natural resources" in NM, under the terms of the Land Use Easement Act (NMSA 1978, Sections 47-12-1 to 47-12-6, 1991).

    Land Trusts
    Land trusts, are "qualified" nonprofit organizations (under Section 501(c)(3), which may hold cultural preservation easements as well as land use easements under NM law. A land trust is a community-based private nonprofit corporation that acquires and manages land or interests in land to preserve the community's unique natural or historic heritage. Some land trusts work to preserve park land or wildlife habitat; others focus on scenic areas or farmland; others endeavor to protect historic structures or battlefields. The community of concern to a land trust may be a single neighborhood, the watershed of a river, or an entire state. Each land trust strives to preserve land for the benefit of all in the community, land that helps gives definition to the community and determines its overall quality of life.

    The Taos Land Trust has protected several farm and ranch properties from development by means of conservation easements. It is also seeking conservation easements for archaeological sites. The Santa Fe Conservation Trust has acquired a conservation easement on a part of the Old Santa Fe Trail and Los Trigos Ranch in San Miguel County and is seeking additional easements on other parts of the Trail. Contact:

    Taos Land Trust
    P.O. Box 376
    Taos, NM 87571
    (505) 751-3134

    Santa Fe Conservation Trust
    P.O. Box 1901
    Santa Fe, NM 87504
    (505) 989-7019

    A land trust has been created by the Sawmill Advisory Council (discussed above) to secure ownership of vacant land previously used for industrial purposes. The acquired land is adjacent to properties being restored with consideration for historic design. National land trusts active in New Mexico include the Trust for Public Land and the Nature Conservancy. Land use easements may protect cultural sites as well, if the land covered by the easement includes historic or archaeological structures or sites.

    Water Banking or Water Rights Pooling
    The private acequia associations of northern New Mexico have shown an interest in preserving both the acequia structures and the water rights held by acequia members. Acequias (irrigation ditches) form the basis of community and cultural life in much of rural New Mexico. The acequia, the community and local culture are threatened when individual owners of water rights in the acequia transfer them to others outside of the acequiLocally administered water-banking or water rights pooling is one of several types of legal mechanisms that allow a water right to be temporarily held and managed by a local water-management entity, such as an acequia association. The intent is for the "banked" water right to be managed or reallocated for the benefit of the other members of the entity, or for the benefit of the local community as a whole. The water right owner has continued use of the water right so that it remains legally viable for future use and thus remains a part of the resource base of the community. Acequia lenders are just beginning to design such mechanisms in response to the threat of development interests that seek to transfer water rights away from their area of origin.

    A conservation easement, land trust or water banking program, or a land use easement, are among the most effective methods of achieving the preservation of historic structures and districts. Through all types of private land use control, significant open spaces, historic building facades, and even acequias can be preserved at low cost to governments and private preservation organizations, and to the financial benefit of the property owner. Contact

    Northern New Mexico Legal Services
    P.O. Box 5175
    Santa Fe, NM 87502-5175
    (505) 982-9886).

    Resources for Private Preservation Associations

    New Mexico Historic Preservation Division

    HPD offers assistance to those interested in forming a historic preservation association and incorporating it as a nonprofit corporation under Section 501(c)(3) or (c)(4). It has programs and seminars on statewide preservation issues and provides technical assistance, working closely with individuals and associations who need information on appropriate restoration methods and materials for particular historic properties. Staff archaeologists give technical assistance to archaeological societies and others interested in protecting archaeological resources. Contact:

    New Mexico Historic Preservation Division
    228 East Palace Avenue
    Santa Fe, NM 87501
    (505) 827-6320

    National Trust for Historic Preservation
    The NTHP is the premier national provider of information about historic preservation and can provide technical assistance to local preservation associations. The Trust sponsors many programs and seminars nationwide, and publishes Preservation Magazine. It also has grant programs available to individual communities and private associations for historic properties such as barns and railroad depots. Contact

    Southwest Field Office, National Trust for Historic Preservation
    500 Main Street, Suite 606
    Fort Worth, TX 76102
    (817) 332-4038).

    New Mexico Historical Society

    The Society is a private organization that advises historic preservation associations. It encourages greater appreciation of New Mexico's historical, architectural and cultural heritage. It publishes a newspaper, La Cronica of New Mexico, publishes books in cooperation with the New Mexico Museum, sponsors an annual conference, administers the HPD program that places plaques on historic properties, raises funds to buy and preserve historic landmarks, encourages the preservation and collection of historic documents, artifacts and other published materials, and presents special events. Contact

    New Mexico Historical Society
    P.O. Box 1912
    Santa Fe, NM 87504

    Archaeological Society of New Mexico
    This Society has as its purpose the preservation of historic and prehistoric remains, landmarks and monuments and the education of public about these resources. It sponsors seminars and workshops and provides a local and regional network for individual archaeology societies. Contact

    Archaeological Society of NM
    P.O. Box 3485
    Albuquerque, NM 87190

    New Mexico Heritage Preservation Alliance The Alliance is a non-profit organization formed in 1995 to serve as a policy forum for heritage preservation. Its purpose is to promote awareness and respect for New Mexico's cultural significance and distinct character. It has annual meetings to discuss state historic preservation issues. Contact

    New Mexico Heritage Preservation Alliance
    P.O. Box 2490
    Santa Fe, NM 87504
    (505) 989-7745).

    Millennium Trails

    Millennium Trails is a national initiative of the U.S. Department of Transportation, in partnership with the Rails to Trails Conservancy and the American Hiking Society. One criterion for nomination is the trail's significance in defining aspects of America's heritage and culture. The NM Route 66 Association applied for designation for New Mexico Route 66. Technical assistance is available for restoration and marketing of a designated road. Contact

    NM Division Office, Federal Highway Administration
    604 W. San Mateo Road
    Santa Fe, NM 87505
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