For Rachel Chrostowski, “permanent” is at the center of all the work that she does.
Chrostowski is the farmland conservation director of the Western New York Land Conservancy; a central part of the WNYLC’s mission is to permanently protect natural spaces and farmland for future generations. At her 9:15 a.m. lecture today in the Hurlbut Church Sanctuary for the Chautauqua Science Group and Chautauqua Climate Change Initiative, Chrostowski will be discussing the importance of permanent conservation, with a special focus on preserving farmland — and the necessity of doing so to keep future generations of Western New Yorkers fed.
If you had asked Chrostowski what she wanted to do for a living right after she graduated from high school, it’s not likely she would have told you she planned to work in the world of conservation. Instead, her career in the field began almost by chance, stumbling into what turned out to be the perfect fit.
“I changed majors a number of times and wound up taking a class in geography,” she said. “It felt like coming home. It took me back to the days of my childhood, walking through and learning about plants and rocks — just diving back into my appreciation for the natural world and learning about the different ways that humans interact with that world, how we can shape it, (and) how it can shape us.”
Chrostowski began her career as a county planner, working on smart growth initiatives and agricultural planning projects in Livingston County and Erie County for nearly 10 years. While working as a county planner, she said her main focus was finding new ways to engage communities and encouraging them to get involved in local conservation.
But working at the county level in New York proved difficult, with most land-use decisions being made at a smaller, community-to-community level. WNYLC was the perfect place for her to make a tangible impact on the communities she had already been serving for nearly a decade.
“That felt like a second homecoming,” she said.
One of WNYLC’s main focuses, Chrostowski said, is finding more solutions to permanently protect farmland; since 2001, New York has lost over 250,000 acres of farmland, with most of it being converted into residential or business developments. Since soil suitable for agriculture can take centuries to naturally develop, once farmland is lost there is almost no way to get it back.
WNYLC’s solution is to ensure that agricultural land can never be turned into something else. They do this by working with farmers to place conservation easements on the deeds of their farms; these easements prevent the land of the farm from being used for anything but agricultural use for as long as the land continues to exist.
Chrostowski’s lecture today will dive further into the work WNYLC does to protect farmland, while also stressing to Chautauquans how important conserving agricultural land is for them and their families. She also encourages Chautauquans to support local farms around them by buying fresh, in-season produce, and by getting involved in their communities through organizations like WNYLC.
“There is never going to be a time when humans don’t need green space, where humans don’t need all of the benefits that the natural world can give us from things like fresh air, clean water, (and) fresh, locally grown food,” Chrostowski said. “Even though forever is a long time, and it’s sort of scary to say, ‘We’re never going to develop this piece of land,’ there’s always going to be a need for the things that this land can provide.”
