A Time to Preserve: A Call for Formal Private-Party Rights in Perpetual Conservation Easements

Increasingly, property owners are employing conservation easements to maintain open space or protect the environment through restrictions on development. Private-party standing to enforce conservation easements, however, has not been so widely embraced, in part because of the perceived inconsistency between private-party standing and private property rights. This Article argues that private-party standing to sue for enforcement of these easements reinforces both the easement grantor's private property rights and society's interest in natural resource preservation. The Article analyzes private-party standing under a reconstituted bundle of property rights theory and the public trust doctrine; examines the efficiency, social justice, and decentralization arguments supporting private-party standing; and responds to potential objections to the proposal.