NCV Board Update: August 2, 2024

We have an important update for you and an invitation to help us achieve success.

From its founding as a 501(c)3 non-profit two years ago, New Community Vision’s mission has been keenly focused on facilitating the acquisition of the former Timber Shores campground property between Omena and Northport as a permanent nature preserve, along with an appropriate portion of the property identified for attainable housing that is so needed in Leelanau.

The recent news of the federal grant award from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (GTB) is a game changer for our efforts to permanently protect this special land.

The multi-million-dollar federal grant has not only raised the profile of this project but underlined NCV’s partnership with the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (GTB), whose commitment was instrumental in being awarded such a large and beneficial grant. Recent media coverage of this exciting news has also highlighted Peninsula Housing, which is collaborating with us on the planned attainable housing. Working together with both the GTB and PH has created strong and broad community-based alliances that have helped accelerate and validate our efforts.

The GTB has a robust and fully-staffed Department of Natural Resources and is admired for its expertise throughout the region on environmental stewardship and restoration initiatives.  The natural features of the former Timber Shores property – and the surrounding fisheries – are important ecologically as well as culturally and spiritually to the GTB. This special landscape will benefit greatly from their permanent stewardship of the 187 acres that will include the future nature preserve.

The terms of the NOAA grant, as well as NCV’s agreement with GTB, includes deed restrictions that this lakeshore gem will be protected as a nature preserve in perpetuity, never to be developed. The land has areas of extremely high conservation value, including significant sections designated as Special Critical Areas in the Grand Traverse Bay Watershed Plan. It deserves the very best care. GTB has the broad expertise and a deep historic connection to this land that ensures it will be stewarded at the highest level possible.   

The terms of the NOAA grant, and NCV’s agreement with GTB, include public access to the nature preserve. The exact scope and design will be determined by the progress of the robust restoration work on the property as well as tribal-led community engagement sessions. As with any nature preserve, low-impact activities like walking, hiking, birdwatching and snowshoeing will be available to all!

NCV believes that the results of these collaborative efforts will become a regional model of success and engagement that will benefit our entire community for generations, connecting all people in the community to the wonders of this remarkable natural asset again.

Securing the future of the former Timber Shores property as both nature preserved and a portion for attainable housing is now well within our reach! Donations and pledges from hundreds of people like you in our community who love and care for the future of Leelanau have been remarkable and are greatly appreciated! 

The task now is to raise the remaining $1.8 million in funding needed to fulfil the exclusive Purchase Option Agreement signed by NCV with the seller. We are incredibly close to success! With your help, we can get there!Please be in touch to discuss your contribution or simply click the buttons below.

Sincerely,

The NCV Board: John Sentell, President; Beth Verhey, Vice President; Dale Lersch, Treasurer; Kate Bulkley, Secretary; Andy Thomas, Board Member

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Glen Arbor Sun NOAA Coverage

Leelanau Enterprise: $11.9M grant awarded

By Meakalia Previch-liu on Wednesday, July 24, 2024 for the Leelanau Enterprise

New Community Vision (NCV), a Northport-based nonprofit, and the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (GTB) are much closer to purchasing and restoring the former Timber Shores RV resort campground.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced July 18 its recommendation of an $11.9 million grant to go towards preservation projects in the Leelanau and Grand Traverse areas.

With these funds, NCV says it now needs to only raise an additional $2 million to reach its fundraising goal to acquire and permanently protect the 214-acre lakeshore property. While 187 acres will not be developed and will remain as a nature preserve stewarded by GTB, an upland 24-acre section of the property not included in the nature preserve portion has been identified for critically-needed attainable housing.

“We are deeply grateful for our close partnership with the Grand Traverse Band,” said NCV Board President John Sentell in a recent press release. “Their expertise and leadership in the stewardship of natural habitats throughout our region reinforces the importance of preserving this special lakeshore property. This close partnership is key to not only preserving and restoring the property, but connecting all people in the community to the wonders of this remarkable natural asset again.”

With about $6.5 million of those funds, the GTB will be able to preserve and restore coastal habitat on Mashkiigaki, a parcel of sacred ancestral land along West Grand Traverse Bay. Although many know of the land being where Timber Shores once stood, it is historically, culturally and spiritually significant to the GTB.

Mashkiigaki means “the place of the medicines,” and represents the importance of the wetlands as a traditionally significant location for hunting, fishing, gathering, and collecting medicines. According to the GTB, the U.S. government brought a treaty to the tribe in 1855 asking that the remaining third of what is now Michigan be ceded to the U.S. government.

When this treaty was signed, a reserve was established that included most of Leelanau County, including the land of where the Timber Shores property now is, and a large tract of land in Antrim County. The treaty was broken many times following this by the federal government, with most of the land being illegally taken from the tribe and its people. With the help of the NOAA grant, the tribe would regain area once removed from their ownership and care.

The remaining grant monies will also support an innovative fish passage project called Giigook man-jowang (FishPass), which will fully reconnect the Boardman-Ottaway River Trail to Lake Michigan. The project will receive $8.9 million in the first year and up to $11.9 million total over three years.

The grant is part of the second round of funds provided through NOAA’ s Transformational Habitat Restoration and Coastal Resilience funding opportunity under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act. NOAA awarded more than $265 million for 38 projects in its first round, while $220 million was recommended for 32 projects in its second round. Projects span a broad range of habitats and restoration techniques, including reconnecting rivers to their historic floodplains, outplanting corals to rebuild reefs, and restoring salt marshes that protect coasts from erosion and sea level rise.

The latest update comes after NCV announced in May its strategic partnerships with the tribe and Peninsula Housing, a community land trust based in Suttons Bay that aims to provide affordable workforce housing in the county. NCVs initial goal was to raise $5 million by the end of 2023, but has since secured an exclusive option agreement and extension with NM Investment Co. and RVTS Investment, giving the group more time to raise funds through the summer.

Development plans for the camp-ground and sewer over the years have been contentious among county residents and local government officials, resulting in application delays and zoning changes along the way. However, since the purchase option was presented last year, NCV has been actively working not only to raise enough money, but to build awareness about the land’s vulnerable ecosystems and history with the tribe that dates back hundreds of years.

Article: https://www.leelanaunews.com/index.php/news/119m-grant-awarded

NCV thanks the Leelanau Enterprise and Meakalia Previch-liu for allowing us to share this coverage with you.

Glen Arbor Sun: Grand Traverse Band lands federal money, New Community Vision support, to acquire Timber Shores property

From staff reports

New Community Vision’s (NCV) two-year effort to acquire and preserve the former Timber Shores property between Omena and Northport will benefit from a multi-million dollar federal grant to the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians (GTB) as part of an overall $11.9 million funding recommendation announced last Thursday by the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The grant is being provided through NOAA’s FY 23 Transformational Habitat and Coastal Resilience grant opportunity—which is funded by the Biden administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act.

NOAA announced the news on July 18. NCV, which launched as a non-profit in 2023 with a vision to re-think how the former Timber Shores property could benefit both current and future generations, has focused on acquiring the property in order to preserve more than 200 acres—including 1,800 feet of lakeshore—as a public nature preserve for the community while using 24 acres in an upland section of the property for affordable housing—an acute issue facing the region. NCV is collaborating with Peninsula Housing to develop attainable housing with community input. Launched in 2022 by Larry Mawby, Peninsula Housing is a community land trust based in Suttons Bay with a mission to provide affordable workforce housing in Leelanau County.

A significant portion of the NOAA grant will be earmarked to integrate with NCV’s ongoing fundraising campaign to acquire the former Timber Shores campground—one of the largest and highest-profile, undeveloped coastal properties available in the Grand Traverse region—specifically for land preservation and restoration. Other allocated grant monies will support GTB’s river restoration efforts on the Lower Boardman-Ottoway River.

The land between Omena and Northport, which sits along West Grand Traverse Bay and was once the site of Timber Shores campground, was later considered for a luxury condo development with a private marina. More recently, developers sought to turn it into an RV park and campground, but faced local pushback and were stopped by a 2022 ballot referendum that opposed the RV park.

According to NCV, the former Timbers Shores property was part of the ancestral homeland of the Grand Traverse Band for more than 300 years. It is called “Mashkiigaki” (pronounced Mashkeegaki) and is historically, culturally and spiritually significant to the Band. Mashkiigaki (Mashkeegaki) means “the place of the medicines” and represents the importance of these wetlands as a traditionally significant location for hunting, fishing, gathering, and collecting medicines. That land was taken from the Band in an 1855 treaty and transferred to non-Native settlers and lumber firms.

“The name for this land is Mashkiigaki, which means marsh lands, but it also means the ‘place of medicine’ because this is where, in times past, tribal members would find food and medicine and connect with the earth,” GTB River Restoration project manager Naomi Louchouarn said at a June event. “To collaborate with NCV and everyone in the area is important for the ecological restoration of this place, but also for the restoration of the irreplaceable cultural and spiritual connections to the land as well.”

NCV needs to raise an additional $2 million to reach its fundraising goal and acquire the Timber Shores property. It hopes to reach that goal by the end of the year, after which the group will transfer the land to the Grand Traverse Band for restoration and preservation.

“We are deeply grateful for our close partnership with the Grand Traverse Band. Their expertise and leadership in the stewardship of natural habitats throughout our region reinforces the importance of preserving this special lakeshore property,” said NCV president John Sentell. “This close partnership is key to not only preserving and restoring the property, but connecting all people in the community to the wonders of this remarkable natural asset again.”

The NOAA grant award will also provide substantial funding for long-term restoration of this parcel’s vital coastal, wetland and fish habitats.

“This is the largest, most significant site available for conservation and restoration located on West Grand Traverse Bay. Coastal resiliency, essential fish habitat, critically rare ecosystems, spectacular vistas—it has it all,” said Sentell.

Acquiring the property will preserve and restore critical ecosystems, including strengthening native fisheries, broadening ecosystem resilience, and advancing priorities within the Coastal Grand Traverse Bay Watershed Plan by preserving and restoring 187 acres of critically sensitive habitat including: 0.75 lineal miles of a Lake Michigan tributary, Ennis Creek, within the property contributing the to the broader health of the 5.3 lineal miles of the full creek; 1,800 feet of Laurentian Great Lakes shoreline; 20 acres of Ennis Creek riparian wetland corridor; 42 acres of fractured wetlands and artificial marina created in the late 1970s for the former campground called Timber Shores.

When coupled with the protected Gull Island offshore, the protection of this parcel creates a virtual “land and water nature preserve” on West Bay, said NCV.

The portion of the overall NOAA grant to the Band for land acquisition will be coupled with critical matching funds secured by NCV through private donations.

“With this grant recommendation from NOAA, we are incredibly close to success. As of now, thanks to donations and monies already pledged, raising an additional $2 million more will get this deal done,” Sentell added. “The importance of protecting this site forever will benefit our broad community and the health of our entire region. As a community, we simply must get this done now.”

The landowner has told New Community Vision that if they are unable to make the purchase, plans for an RV campground could move forward again.

Source: https://glenarborsun.com/grand-traverse-band-lands-federal-money-new-community-vision-support-to-acquire-timber-shores-property/

NCV thanks the Glen Arbor Sun for allowing us to share this article with you.