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Regional Governance

A regional recovery strategy brings together local communities, landowners, counties, state agencies, insurers, and corporate buyers in a regional partnership that links those who steward the land with those who benefit from its recovery. Rather than simply paying for damage after a wildfire or flood, the partnership invests in reducing risks at their source, restoring the forests, grasslands, and watersheds on which the larger region depends. Sovereign Land helps organize the financing, operations, and long-term agreements, but takes no ownership interest, title, or lien on the land.

A Regional Renewal Corporation is a nonprofit, regionally governed institution modeled on regional economic development corporations but designed specifically for watershed and landscape renewal. Its function is to pool public, private, and philanthropic capital; direct that capital toward restoration and stewardship; and back contracts that give local people a meaningful seat at the table while giving public and private investors confidence that resources will be allocated where they are most needed. Just as important, it provides the institutional continuity needed to keep the work going long enough to make a lasting difference at scales that have broader impacts.

Participation does not require landowners, land grants, pueblos, counties, or other governments to surrender title, sovereignty, or local control. The Corporation does not buy land or hold liens on participating properties. It does not buy or sell water either.

Downstream beneficiaries pay for the work on the mountain, not for the water, and the water stays with the communities that hold it today. Because many beneficiaries, towns, utilities, acequias, insurers, and businesses, can pay collectively for the same upland work, no single participant has to carry a cost it could not bear alone. That shared payment is what can sustain the work over decades.

Four people around a large map on a wooden table in an adobe kitchen.
Our team designing fire-adapted landscapes with wildfire expert Chris Schaum, Santa Fe.

Structure

The Site Stewardship Committees decide the work on each site. The Corporation, a nonprofit, regionally governed institution, has a Governing Board of 15 rotating seats, three committees and a shared revenue pool, with an Advisory Council, regional partners and shared services around it. Sovereign Land designs the institution and holds no ownership interest, title, or lien on the land.

Sovereign LandInstitution architectMacroeconomic assessmentEcosystem designField operations and contractingUnderwritingLandStackNo ownership interest, title, orlien on the land.Regional Renewal CorporationA nonprofit, regionally governed institutionGoverning Board15 seats, rotatingThree committeesOperationsData, monitoring and standardsFinance and investmentShared revenue poolan established operationpays for the nextAROUND THE CORPORATIONAdvisory CouncilRegional Partners and StakeholdersShared Services and SupportTruchas-CostillaMora and San MiguelQuestaRatonWheaton CreekSite Stewardship CommitteesOne per site, the work decided on the landDecisions on title, sovereignty or a party’s control of its land remain with that party.

Regional Renewal Corporation

A nonprofit, regionally governed institution

  • Governing Board

    15 seats, rotating

  • Three committees

    Operations. Data, monitoring and standards. Finance and investment.

  • Shared revenue pool

    an established operation pays for the next

Around the Corporation

  • Advisory Council

  • Regional Partners and Stakeholders

  • Shared Services and Support

Site Stewardship Committees

One per site, the work decided on the land

  • Truchas-Costilla

  • Mora and San Miguel

  • Questa

  • Raton

  • Wheaton Creek

Sovereign Land

Institution architect

  • Macroeconomic assessment

  • Ecosystem design

  • Field operations and contracting

  • Underwriting

  • LandStack

  • No ownership interest, title, or lien on the land.

Decisions on title, sovereignty or a party’s control of its land remain with that party.
Ranchers gathered in a working meeting.
Mora, New Mexico community members planning the work.

Ecology and People

Restoring landscapes is as much about people and relationships as it is about ecology.

The same principles apply here in northern New Mexico, where land grants, acequias, Pueblo communities, and ranching families have sustained relationships with the land for centuries. Lasting restoration must build on that knowledge and history, respecting local traditions and decision-making while creating new opportunities for communities to shape and benefit from the recovery of their landscapes.

Stewardship Integrated with Finance

The work on the ground, decided by the Site Stewardship Committees, drives the contracts and the finance, and feeds back into economic development and more funding.

Sangre de Cristo Regional Renewal CorporationA loop of three lines across four stations, read from the land. The work on the ground, decided by the Site Stewardship Committees of five sites, runs right along the evidence line through two-speed monitoring, reporting and verification to the Regional Renewal Corporation, the downstream counterparties and the exposed financial institutions behind them, where verified results set the performance-based terms of each contract. At the right end evidence brings capital. The money line runs back left: tiered contracts on cost reductions and ecosystem services, through the Corporation, to the land as evolutionary-adaptive finance, where money becomes work. The contract line through the middle is the three-way contract, the Corporation as third signatory. On the left, outside the loop, Sovereign Land as institution architect: macroeconomic assessment, ecosystem design, field operations and contracting, underwriting and LandStack, with no ownership interest, title or lien on the land.Evolutionary-adaptive financereleased as the land respondsTiered contractson cost reductions and ecosystem servicesCapital behind the contractsand in time invested in the vehicleThree-way contractsthe Corporation signs witheach operator and its buyerThird signatoryinsures the work and pools the riskTwo-speed monitoring,reporting and verificationthe work verified seasons aheadof the ecological responseVerified resultsset the performance-basedterms of each contractVerified resultsreach the institutionsmoneybecomesworkevidencebringscapitalSovereign LandInstitution architectMacroeconomic assessmentEcosystem designField operations and contractingUnderwritingLandStackNo ownership interest,title, or lien on the land.Site StewardshipCommitteesOne per site, the workdecided on the landTruchas-CostillaMora and San MiguelQuestaRatonWheaton CreekRegional RenewalCorporationThird signatory to every contractGoverning Board15 seats, rotatingShared revenue poolan established operation pays for the nextEcosystem integrity creditsgranted downstream, redeemed uplandThree committeesOperations. Data, monitoring andstandards. Finance and investment.DownstreamcounterpartiesThe most exposed in the rangeWater plants and utilitiesAcequias andirrigation districtsCounties, towns and villagesPower and transportBusinesses and institutionsExposed financialinstitutionsBehind the counterpartiesInsurers and reinsurersBanks and mortgage creditPublic lenders and bondholdersFunds, pensions andsovereign fundsRegional Partners and Stakeholders. Advisory Council. Shared Services and Support. Decisions on title, sovereignty or a party’s control of its land remain with that party.

Regional Renewal Corporation

Third signatory to every contract

  • Governing Board

    15 seats, rotating

  • Shared revenue pool

    an established operation pays for the next

  • Ecosystem integrity credits

    granted downstream, redeemed upland

  • Three committees

    Operations. Data, monitoring and standards. Finance and investment.

Sovereign Land

Institution architect

  • Macroeconomic assessment

  • Ecosystem design

  • Field operations and contracting

  • Underwriting

  • LandStack

No ownership interest, title, or lien on the land.

Regional Partners and Stakeholders. Advisory Council. Shared Services and Support. Decisions on title, sovereignty or a party’s control of its land remain with that party.

Institutions

Side by side with institutions.

Sovereign Land works with national laboratories, universities, regulatory agencies, government institutions, conservation and rural development organizations, and specialists in landscape finance and management. Our approach is to build on the knowledge, experience, and capacity of existing institutions rather than create new structures that duplicate or replace them.

Los Alamos National Laboratory

Principles

Our work is guided by a set of core principles: We do not seek ownership, control, or financial claims against the land, nor do we displace the people and communities who have stewarded it for generations. We respect local knowledge, cultural traditions, property rights, and the authority of communities to determine their own futures. Our role is to bring together the ecological expertise, governance, and financing needed to support their efforts, not to impose outside priorities. Above all, we believe that financial arrangements must serve the long-term health of the land and its people, rather than reshaping landscapes and communities to fit the demands of investors.

Sovereign Land, Governance