What is the Agricultural and Working Lands Conservation Plan?
Mariposa County applied for and received the Sustainable Agricultural Lands Conservation (SALC) Planning Grant to fund the creation of an Agricultural and Working Landscape Conservation Plan (AWLCP). The AWLCP is key for carrying out specific General Plan tasks and helps protect our working lands while also achieving the State's Greenhouse Gas reduction and climate goals.
With roughly half of the County’s 1,463 square miles designated as Agricultural/Working Land Use under the County’s General Plan, Agriculture is a big part of what makes Mariposa special. Keeping these lands safe and healthy is at the heart of the community’s General Plan. While Mariposa County has established policies for conservation of Agriculture and Open Space, agricultural lands are still likely to face conversion risks in the future. The AWLCP supports these policies by calculating the value of agricultural and working lands and demonstrating the importance of conservation planning and related programs (Land Conservation Act).
Additionally, there are fundamental, yet not fully understood, impacts of climate change on all of Mariposa County’s landscapes, including its agricultural ones. As warmer temperatures, changing wildlife behaviors, and catastrophic events like wildfire, drought, and flooding continue to reshape the environment, the sustainability and viability of current agricultural practices becomes increasingly uncertain. Through the SALC project and AWLCP development, the hope is to better understand the critical contributions that Mariposa County’s agricultural lands both currently make, and could make later, to our economic and ecological future.
Who created the AWLCP?
The Mariposa County project partners and core team included the Mariposa County Resource Conservation District, California Cattlemen’s Association, University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources Cooperative Extension, Sierra Foothill Conservancy, Mariposa Future Farmers of America, and the County Agricultural Commissioner’s Office.
Who funded the AWLCP creation?
This project was funded by the California Department of Conservation’s SALC Program which protects at-risk agricultural lands from sprawl development in order to promote growth within existing jurisdictions, ensure open space remains available, and support a healthy agricultural economy.
Contact
Please direct any questions to Hannah Harrison, Community Design and Development Planner, Mariposa County Planning Department. hharrison@mariposacounty.org // 209.742.1343
