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Conway, NH - At its 24th annual gathering, Upper Saco Valley Land Trust (USVLT) conferred three first-ever recognitions: the Award for Excellence in Volunteerism, the Conservation Colleague Award, and the President’s Award for Damn Good Work.

The meeting, held May 4 at Tin Mountain Conservation Center, in Albany, featured keynoter Rick Van de Poll, Ph.D., educator-naturalist, who afterward guided attendees on a walk at Chain of Ponds, in Madison, which USVLT will acquire in November if its $1.3-million goal is met.

Chain of Ponds feeds pristine Silver Lake. USVLT is partnering with The Conservation Fund and the Madison Conservation Commission, whose chairman, Ralph Lutjen, reaffirmed to meeting-goers the town’s desire that the 625-acre tract be preserved.

At the honors presentation, Ann Bennett, of Jackson, was given USVLT’s highest volunteer award, for consensus-building and “her patent humility as a fundraiser, coalescing the altruism of others like her” to drive the organization’s 1,250-acre Dundee Community Forest acquisition to completion last year. The organization named Bennett “Her Honor, Madam Mayor of Dundee.”

Saco River Brewing was cited for its vigorous support of efforts by USVLT and the Town of Fryeburg, Maine to protect Jockey Cap, an area landmark and rock-climbing venue. The trust thanked Saco River Brewing’s staff—the “whole heady, foamy bunch of you”—for the company’s “loving craft [that] helps protect your namesake aquifer, from which you draw your sweet, happy, hoppy, tangy, quenching waters, and which we quaff with joy.” Jenna Irish of SRB accepted for the family-owned brewery.

USVLT’s President’s Award for Damn Good Work went to Linda Comeau, a principal founder of the trust, who has served as a board member, contractor, employee, land negotiator, property steward and fundraiser, and has “long and lovingly taken care of our sweet valley-and-mountain-and-bog-and-stream-and-creaturely home, which life’s work entitles you hereinafter to be known as Ms. Land Lady of the Valley.”

To read the article on the Conway Daily Sun's website, please click here.

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