We believe forest land should be saved from sprawl

The single largest threat to the future of our nation’s forest resource is urban sprawl. Once a forest is removed for residential or commercial development, it’s likely never going to be forest again.

More than 75% of the forest landowners in the northeastern United States are private individuals or families. Rising property taxes and commercial opportunities often create pressure on these landowners to sell or develop, even though they would much prefer to keep their lands as forest. Finch foresters help landowners manage their lands sustainably and generate enough revenue from responsible timber harvesting, recreational leasing programs and other environmentally sound activities to afford to keep their forests as forest.

Having more forest land means having a larger carbon sink. Any forest is a natural carbon store but it becomes a carbon sink when it is increasing in size or density. Because healthy forests generate more growth than we harvest, the forests we manage have met the definition of a carbon sink for the last 20 years. Currently, it is estimated that the forests under Finch management store more than 34 million tons of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere.