Jerome Speltz wants to make sure his 80 acres of woodland near Rollingstone stays that way.

He wants a guarantee that his four sons can hunt there when they want and that no greater force will come along and take it away.

"My sons want me to keep this place as a legacy," he said. "Development would ruin it. I want a perpetual easement for my sons and my friends, which I think is a pretty nice thing."

Speltz, a retired farm veterinarian who lives in Winona, doesn't feel he has enough protection merely by owning the property. That's why he and many other property owners have turned to conservation easements through the Minnesota Land Trust.

The nine-year-old organization uses conservation easements to protect remaining natural, scenic and agricultural land. So far it has protected nearly 10,000 acres involving more than 100 landowners. Clint Miller is the land trust's southeastern Minnesota conservation director.

"If you have a willing seller and he wants to keep his property the way it is, that's part of what this program can do," he said.

A conservation easement is a legal document that places a set of restrictions on property to preserve its conservation values. The easement is voluntarily initiated by the landowners, who retain ownership and can sell, transfer or leave the land through a will. The easement remains with the land forever.

And it gives landowners more property rights, not less, Miller said.

"It gives that legal mechanism that perpetuates that easement forever," he said. "It gives them a feeling that someone is looking out for their interests."

Owners must notify the land trust of changes to the land or in ownership, allow periodic monitoring visits and comply with easement restrictions. The land trust oversees and enforces the easement terms and, if necessary, legally defends it in cases of violations.

In turn, the landowner can claim a federal income tax deduction and may earn reduced federal estate taxes, an effective way to transfer land knowing natural features will remain intact. An easement that removes development rights also lowers property taxes.

"If there's land development next to my land, my land value will go up and my taxes will go up," Speltz said.

Sometimes landowners discover parcels around them suddenly have been sold off and developed, leaving neighbors with a starkly different neighborhood. Elwood Rieke is a land trust member from La Crescent who has seen that city's growth gobble up surrounding landscape.

"All of a sudden you see the land taken up," he said.

Said Miller: "If these mechanisms had existed, the family may have been able to hold on to the land."

A mile or so south of Winona in East Burns Valley lies The Winona Farm and its owners, Dick and Sue Gallien. They signed a conservation easement with the land trust in January.

"For over 30 years I've been looking for a way to permanently protect The Winona Farm's 175 acres from development," Dick Gallien said.

It took about six years to work out. Gallien drew part of his inspiration - ironically - from the main lobby of Merchants Bank, where a 1912 painting by Albert Fleury hangs, showing a pastoral West Burns Valley, a time capsule of Winona's former countryside.

Normally, the land trust works with landowners to donate easements. In this case, grant money helped purchase the easement.

"We hope this is a situation that will change in the future so there can be options besides donated easements," Miller said.

Gallien's easement involves the Minnesota departments of Natural Resources and Transportation. The DNR received a federal scenic byway grant of $212,000 and combined it with a DNR natural and scenic area grant of $54,000. This will be granted to Wilson Township, which in turn pays Gallien for the easement - co-owned by the township and the land trust.

Wayne Sames manages the DNR's local grants programs.

"I think it had a lot to do with the Township's interest. They're feeling development pressure and they're willing to help Dick keep his property undeveloped."

Gallien's property already contains a public access easement to allow trout anglers onto East Burns Valley Creek.

"What we're really trying to do is to protect that landscape, a representative landscape of a Mississippi River tributary valley," Sames said.

A dedication ceremony will be held later this year. Miller hopes nearby landowners begin to see the same values as Gallien.

"If we don't continue to work with people on up the valley, we could have leap frog development," Miller said.

The land trust has targeted five areas in southeastern Minnesota for conservation: the Upper Mississippi River bluff lands, the watersheds of the Cannon, Zumbro and Root rivers, and the LeSueur Lakes area between Faribault and Mankato.

It also focuses on threatened landscapes like woodlands and prairies, scenic views, archaeological sites, algific slopes, bird rookeries and river terraces.

"In southeastern Minnesota, these core areas are pretty easy to pick out because everything else is cropland," Miller said.

The Minnesota Land Trust formed an alliance with similar groups in Wisconsin, Iowa and Illinois to protect bluff lands from development. It is most interested in contiguous blocks of intact landscape, unbroken by development or roads - what Miller calls "no-brainer sites - the areas where we know we're going to be working."

It also prioritizes landscapes by the degree of threat - where development radiates out from existing cities like Winona, La Crescent, Red Wing and La Crosse, Wis.

The rapid suburban growth in the Twin Cities has made it a hot spot for conservation easements, Sames said. Landowners there want to "acquire open space area before the land prices become so high that it becomes prohibitive to do that," he said.

Local government land use planning is still the best tool to address growth and green space, Miller said.

"Conservation easements are not the answer to urban and rural sprawl, they are just one of the tools useful for maintaining a healthy landscape," Miller said.

Dick Gallien knows a much stronger incentive - millions of dollars of development money - likely will win out in most land transfers

"If (landowners) have a choice to take the money and run or do what I did, I'm afraid they'd take the money," he said.

Contact reporter Jeff Dankert at jdankert@winonadailynews.com, or (507) 453-3513.