New England Policy Chronicle
Updates from Around the Region
Editor’s Note: In our last issue, we noted the broad uncertainty surrounding how the transition in Washington, D.C., would manifest in environmental and conservation policy changes. Though the extent of President Trump’s agenda and how it will reshape federal policy has yet to be fully realized, it is now abundantly clear that the administration is trying to radically and abruptly shift the role that the federal government has played in protecting the land, water, and air we all share. As the government begins to roll back existing contracts and commitments and to reduce its overall capacity to support public and private partners through layoffs and funding freezes, other institutions will need to adjust their approaches to ensure the continuity of essential conservation, environmental protection, and a broader set of values-aligned initiatives necessary to sufficiently support communities nationwide.
This installment of the New England Policy Chronicle highlights developments from around the region that demonstrate how state-level land use decisions are taking shape in light of these recent shifts in federal perspective and policy.
Find other examples of how allies around the region are approaching policy change in our Policy Desk Archive. - Alex Redfield, Co-Director of the Integrated Policy Program for Wildlands, Woodlands, Farmlands & Communities and Food Solutions New England
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Connecticut
Offshore Wind Stalled
The first of 65 turbines in the Revolution Wind project came online in September of 2024. Connecticut has invested significant public dollars in both onshore and offshore infrastructure for wind energy development, but future investments are now in question. Photo courtesy of Kate Ciembronowicz/Ørsted.
In 2023, the state of Connecticut outlined plans to achieve net-zero carbon energy by 2040 and to become the central hub for clean energy production on the Eastern Seaboard. With the release of Connecticut’s Offshore Wind Strategic Roadmap, policymakers identified the state’s next steps for new infrastructure, capacity, and policy tools that could support rapid growth in the sector, resulting in a flurry of new contracts and new projects launching over the past two years. However, just 14 months after the release of the Roadmap, challenging market conditions and an immediate withdrawal of federal support for offshore wind projects have combined to stall Connecticut’s efforts to capture significant wind energy off its coast. In late December, Connecticut officials declined to select any bids from wind developers in the first round of a “three state solicitation” collaborative between southern New England states. This partnership between Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut had been designed to secure more favorable terms for ratepayers in future offshore wind contracts for all three states, but December’s announcement from Connecticut regulators may jeopardize the future of this collaboration before it even begins. Indeed, soon after Connecticut announced their decision to “take a pass” on new wind contracts, developers announced that they were canceling plans for the Vineyard Wind 2 installation, a new development that was slated to provide 800 megawatts of wind energy to Massachusetts and 400 megawatts to Connecticut.
In the same press release that announced the current pivot away from offshore wind, Gov. Ned Lamont’s administration announced three new ground-mount solar contracts to increase clean energy available to the Connecticut grid. This clearly demonstrates the implications of a shift away from coastal energy development: If states are going to achieve their decarbonization goals without offshore wind, onshore infrastructure will need to pick up the slack, further challenging regulators to strike a nuanced balance between protecting farms and forests from conversion and ensuring solar development can proceed quickly enough to meet our collective energy needs.
Maine
The Future of Land for Maine’s Future
New legislation in Maine would direct mitigation and permitting fees collected from new energy transmission projects as a dedicated revenue source for conservation projects through the Land for Maine’s Future (LMF) program. Construction on the Northeast Clean Energy Connect transmission lines, pictured here, is slated to conclude in 2026 and will provide Massachusetts ratepayers with 1,200 megawatts of clean energy sourced from Hydro Quebec. Photo courtesy of New England Clean Energy Connect
Maine’s primary source of state funding for land protection and conservation efforts, the Land for Maine’s Future (LMF) program, is on track to spend down the last of its allocated funding by the end of this fiscal year. With deep uncertainty about the continued availability of federal funding for conservation projects, advocates are hoping that Governor Janet Mills and allies in the Maine Legislature will be able to secure both short- and long-term funding to shore up the program. LMF has enjoyed broad public support, with voters consistently approving bond requests to advance land protection and approving a $40 million allocation in 2021. These allocations have supported acquisition and protection of more than 650,000 acres, including more than 333,000 acres of working farms and forests, over nearly 40 years of grantmaking.
In Governor Mills’s January budget proposal, new allocations for LMF (and the majority of other recommendations put forward in the Maine Won’t Wait climate planning process) failed to make the cut, with a perceived drop in state revenue on the horizon. At the same time, legislators have introduced bills that would generate both immediate funding through a citizen-approved bond proposal and ongoing revenue from permitting and mitigation fees associated with energy transmission corridors and new mining projects.
Though the proportion of federal conservation dollars compared to state sources varies widely across the region (see figure below), the impact of any significant shift in federal funding priorities would be felt regionally, underscoring the importance of robust state funding mechanisms to ensure the continuity of existing efforts.
Federal (blue) and state (red) allocations of conservation spending between 2004 and 2014 across New England. Federal funding has historically accounted for between 25 and 76 percent of public conservation spending in the region, and would likely represent a much larger share of total spending if recent programs were included in the analysis. If federal land protection programs are paused or otherwise made unavailable, new sources of revenue would be needed to maintain the current pace of conservation activity, and to accelerate sufficiently to reach 30x30 land protection targets. Figure courtesy of Public Conservation Funding in New England by Mary Buchanan.
Massachusetts
Multi-Family Housing as a Right
Nearly 200 communities in Massachusetts are required to update municipal zoning standards to allow for multi-family housing development near public transportation access points. Explore which towns and cities are or aren’t compliant with the new requirements in this interactive MBTA Communities Map from WBUR. Image courtesy of the Massachusetts Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities
In a significant development for housing policy in Massachusetts, on January 8, the state’s Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) upheld the constitutionality of the MBTA Communities Act. This decision confirms the state’s authority to mandate that 177 municipalities served by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (MBTA) establish zoning districts permitting multi-family housing by right. The MBTA Communities Act, passed in 2021, continues to roll out across the commonwealth with a staggered implementation timeline and numerous legal challenges. Over the past four years, the core intent of the Act has remained intact, serving as a legislated method to spur development of dense and accessible communities.
In early 2024, Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell sued the town of Milton, one of nearly 50 municipalities that remain noncompliant with the MBTA Communities Act standards, when residents rejected updates to their zoning standards. The SJC’s ruling affirmed the attorney general’s power to enforce compliance and upheld the state’s ability to withhold funding from communities that fail to comply. Shortly after the ruling, the Massachusetts Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities filed new rules for the program, offering municipalities that previously missed compliance deadlines an additional six months to align their zoning bylaws with the Act’s requirements. This extension aims to balance the urgency of increasing housing supply with the practical challenges municipalities face in amending local zoning laws.
Though the requirements of the MBTA Communities Act directly affect only the communities on or adjacent to transit lines, the structure and impact of this legislation will be monitored closely elsewhere in New England. Throughout the region, long-standing commitments to “home rule,” local zoning requirements, and community-level public sentiment often discourage the development of new housing projects—despite the clear need. The Massachusetts law, as a representation of a strategic effort to promote equitable housing development in proximity to public transit, could serve as a model for lawmakers in other states seeking to promote the rapid development of new housing while also attempting to limit the impact of sprawl and unchecked development on natural and working lands.
New Hampshire
The Housing Crisis: “Snob Zoning” and Current Use
Southern New Hampshire continues to wrestle with a significant housing shortage and is seeking legislative options to make development simpler. Vose Farm, a 96-unit project in Peterborough, New Hampshire, is the kind of project that might be eligible for a Land Use Change Tax waiver if advocates successfully amend the state’s Current Use program. Photo courtesy of Vose Farm Residences
New Hampshire lawmakers are slated to review several bills aimed at addressing the state’s housing crisis by reducing local control over zoning regulations. Proposed legislation includes House Bill 577, seeking to amend the definition of accessory dwelling units; House Bill 459, mandating a minimum lot size of half an acre for any development; and House Bill 631, permitting mixed-use and residential development by right in areas currently zoned for commercial use. Proponents, such as Rep. Joe Alexander, R-Goffstown, argue that these measures are necessary to eliminate exclusionary practices, often referred to as “snob zoning,” that hinder affordable housing development. Conversely, municipal officials are expressing concern that such state-level interventions could undermine municipal autonomy, disrupt established land-use plans, and potentially increase the tax burden on residential property owners. This legislative push reflects a growing tension between the need for statewide housing solutions and the preservation of local governance.
Another housing strategy under consideration in the New Hampshire Legislature involves a proposed amendment to the state’s Current Use Program. Since 1973, landowners with property enrolled in Current Use have benefited from reduced property tax assessments on natural and open lands to ensure they remain as farms, forests, or open space available for public access and enjoyment. In exchange for that reduced property tax burden, landowners must pay a “Land Use Change Tax” if a property is withdrawn from the program and ultimately developed. Senate Bill 55 proposes waiving that Land Use Change Tax, equivalent to 10 percent of the parcel’s fair market value, in situations where landowners are withdrawing their property for development of multi-family housing. This would theoretically reduce the overall cost of a new housing development. At a Commerce Committee Hearing on January 27, 2024, nearly forty individuals and organizations submitted testimony in opposition to this amendment, noting that this tax serves as a key revenue source for local municipalities in their efforts to expand services or to protect other sensitive parcels, and that properties enrolled in Current Use play an outsized role in ensuring the viability of forest- and farm-based businesses in rural parts of the state. Changes to Current Use could have a significant impact on New Hampshire’s landscape, as 73 percent of the undeveloped, privately owned land in New Hampshire is enrolled in the program, the highest percentage in all of New England.
Rhode Island
Land Back: Successes and Challenges
A 2017 action by members and allies of the Pokanoket Nation led to the eventual return of Potumtuk, a 375-acre parcel in Bristol, Rhode Island, to the Wampanoag people. Photo courtesy of Po Metacom Camp
In a moment where public and philanthropic dollars are coalescing around the ethical and ecological importance of returning land to its original Indigenous stewards, the Trump administration is all but certain to end any federal support of land return initiatives. Though final decisions about the continuity of individual programs and agency mandates have yet to be made, the widespread commitment to ending federal spending on both climate change mitigation efforts and public efforts to support diversity, equity, and inclusion will clearly conflict with core elements of key conservation programs built out in the previous administration. The America the Beautiful Challenge, a cornerstone of the Biden-Harris conservation agenda, leveraged federal and philanthropic dollars to simultaneously expand Indigenous ownership and landscape-scale conservation projects—contributing in no small part to the 420,000 acres of total land returned to tribes over the past 20 years (read how the America the Beautiful Challenge contributed to the return of 31,000 acres to the Penobscot Nation in Salmon are Creatures of the Forest from FTGU Issue #2). As the fate of these federal investments hangs in the balance, other institutions must fill the gap to retain the momentum in supporting equitable, effective conservation through land return.
In 2017, nearly 100 members and allies of the Pocasset Wampanoag tribe of the Pokanoket Nation set up an encampment on Potumtuk (known contemporarily as Mount Hope) in Bristol, Rhode Island, owned by Brown University since 1955. Notably, Potumtuk was the site of the execution of Po Metacom after he led the regional revolt against the colonizers known widely as King Philip’s war. The occupation by Indigenous leaders called for Brown administrators to return the lands of cultural and ancestral significance that had been illegally seized nearly 350 years ago. After nearly a month of negotiation with the University, the encampment disbanded when Brown agreed to transfer the land back to a preservation trust managed by the Pokanoket people. In late 2024, that commitment was upheld and the University transferred 255 acres, marking a significant moment in Indigenous land reclamation efforts in southern New England.
As institutions and governments increasingly recognize the historical displacement of Indigenous communities, this case may inspire other universities, municipalities, and private landowners to reevaluate their land holdings and engage in discussions about restitution, stewardship agreements, or co-management strategies with Tribes. Just one month after the Potumtuk parcel was returned, the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management announced an Open Space Grant in support of the Pocasset Pokanoket Land Trust’s acquisition of a nearby 40-acre Atlantic White Cedar swamp in Tiverton, further bolstering the landbase under stewardship of the Pocasset Wampanoag people.
Though the Brown transfer was perhaps spurred on more by public relations or moral considerations than environmental benefits, the shift in federal policy only reinforces the clarion call for building relationships, offering material support, and working together to build an equitable future for our neighbors and shared spaces.
Vermont
The Turning Point: Cooperating for Forest Conservation
For an in-depth look at policy questions surrounding Vermont land use and land protection, see The Turning Point: Cooperating for Forest Conservation, an opinion piece by Jamey Fidel of the Vermont Natural Resources Council.
The Vermont Legislature is gearing up—stay tuned for further developments as we learn about them.
Alex Redfield is the Co-Director of the Integrated Policy Program for Wildlands, Woodlands, Farmlands & Communities and Food Solutions New England. He lives in South Portland, Maine.