Bear-Paw works closely with the landowners and Towns in its region on a variety of land protection projects. With our project partners, we have helped protect over 2,300 acres in our region and we hold easements on sixteen properties covering 1,100 acres. While there are other conservation organizations working in the region and throughout the state, Bear-Paw Regional Greenways is a community-based organization that gives landowners a local choice. We are a land trust with close contacts to the communities that we serve and with the ability to work on projects that may be too small to interest statewide organizations or organizations based outside our region.

Population growth and sprawling development are consuming both our natural areas and our community character. According to a recent report:

• The population of New Hampshire has more than doubled since 1950;
• Its population is expected to grow by another 28% by 2025;
• Eighty percent of this projected growth will occur in the southeastern third of the state;
• New Hampshire is losing over 17,000 acres of forestland each year; and
• Within fifty to one hundred years, most parts of southeastern and central New Hampshire will be developed.*

The Bear-Paw region sits between the city and suburbs of Manchester and the Seacoast and covers approximately 177,000 acres. In 2003-2004, Bear-Paw spearheaded an effort to map the region's natural resources - drinking water supplies, wetlands, surface waters, wildlife and plant habitat, productive farmland and forestland, and other natural characteristics. As a result of the project, Bear-Paw identified almost 19,000 acres of undeveloped land that was rich in resources and found that only 3,100 acres of this land was protected. There are also another 114,000 acres of undeveloped land that could also be considered for protection but are of lower priority.  Protecting these areas is the focus of our efforts.

*Excerpted from the Society from the Protection of New Hampshire Forests' 2005 report "New Hampshire's Changing Landscape."