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Passing forest land on to the next generation is a process with financial, legal, and emotional dimensions. To be successful in passing on both the land, and an active commitment to its stewardship, you must actually transfer three things:

» The land itself
» A commitment to good management
» A passion for the land.

Family communication is critical, whether the property is to stay in the family, be given some protection in a conservation easement, or another agreed-to outcome.

There are educational and professional resources available to help your family work through some of these steps and options, and more are in development.

We hope this site can provide or direct you to useful resources on succession planning and related topics.

TIES TO THE LAND Educational Materials

:: TIES TO THE LAND Facilitated Workshop - a DVD-based program
:: TIES TO THE LAND Workbook
:: Supporting resources for families, such as this website, including Related Resources
:: Supporting resources for educators and workshop facilitators included on the workshop DVD or this site

To see an introduction to the TTL curriculum, watch this streaming video!
The TIES TO THE LAND succession planning program can help families communicate better about what to do with their property and how best to get it done.

Communication may be the difference between an estate plan, which directs the transfer of assets, and a succession plan that helps transfer, from one generation to the next, the vision, the passion and the skills needed to be stewards of the land.

For this reason, our program emphasizes passion, commitment, and communication. We do address technical legal and accounting mechanisms of estate planning in this program, but these are not our main emphases. More information about many of those topics can be found on the Related Resources page.

The TIES TO THE LAND succession planning curriculum is made up of several integrated components:

TIES TO THE LAND Facilitated Workshop on Succession Planning

The TIES TO THE LAND Workshop (DVD-based program) is a practical introduction to succession planning for woodland owners and the generations that will succeed them.

The program helps families recognize important barriers to succession, provides an understanding of how the process can be moved forward, and presents a number of communication tools and skills families can use to improve their ability to steer their way through the succession planning and intergenerational transfer process.

The TIES TO THE LAND Facilitated Workshop DVD allows the powerful TIES TO THE LAND program to travel to any interested community. Designed for use in a locally hosted and facilitated workshop setting, the Workshop DVD captures the essence of our well-tested, live workshop while retaining the flexible, interactive structure that has made TIES TO THE LAND such a popular and effective program.

The Workshop DVD contains the complete workshop plus resources needed to facilitate a local succession planning program:

Workshop Section

The Facilitated Workshop DVD costs $175 (includes one copy of the workbook for the facilitator) and can be ordered online.
This section provides the TIES TO THE LAND workshop featuring instructors Clint Bentz and Mark Green with supporting graphics and video. The workshop is divided into 6 modules, with about 2 hours and 20 minutes total content, plus five interactive activities that a facilitator can customize to the audience.

Facilitator Section

This section of the DVD provides support for workshop hosts & facilitators, including Facilitator Guidelines, activity sheets and draft workshop promotional materials (that can be customized for local workshops).

Any group or agency such as a local woodland or Tree Farmer organization, state Forestry Departments, and Cooperative Extension Programs can sponsor or host a TIES TO THE LAND workshop. Click here for information on how to bring this program to your local area.

TIES TO THE LAND: Your Family Forest Heritage. The Workbook

The workbook costs $25 and may be ordered online.
This workbook helps guide family forest landowners through a smooth succession process by providing tools and resources that will help families make the decisions necessary to achieve their objectives and pass their land to succeeding generations. The workbook was developed as a companion to the TIES TO THE LAND Workshop, to provide participants some practical materials to take home use with their families. The workbook also contains a companion DVD with a keynote address presented by Clint Bentz, cautionary tales, and some related documents. (This is not the same as the Facilitated Workshop DVD).

  Samples from the Workbook and Workbook DVD:  
 
Table of Contents
Page 1
Pages 4 and 5		  
  Three Cautionary Tales (from the workbook DVD):
(View videos with RealPlayer or Windows Media Player)		  

Not What Dad Wanted
A Tale of Two Sons
Deathbed Planning

Bringing a TIES TO THE LAND Program to Your Area

We have tried to make it easy for any group or agency such as a local Tree Farmer or other woodland organization, state Forestry Departments, and Cooperative Extension Programs to sponsor or facilitate TIES TO THE LAND workshops locally. The Workshop DVD is a ready to use package with complete workshop content and supporting materials for facilitators. Hosting a TIES TO THE LAND workshop should not be much more complicated than hosting a live speaker. You will find most of what you need to organize, advertise and facilitate a TIES TO THE LAND program is on the Workshop DVD, and we will post additional materials as things develop. Watch the Collaboration page for more information.

Workshop Section

The workshop itself is on the DVD. The virtual instructors, Clint Bentz and Mark Green, deliver the workshop content, so the facilitator does not need to have special expertise in this subject area. You will need to provide a projection and audio system suitable to the size of your audience and venue, but otherwise, it is ready to go. The workshop is divided into 6 modules, with about 2 hours and 20 minutes of total content. There are also five designed activities, to be conducted between each of the modules (the facilitator's job). Activities can be customized by the facilitator to suit the audience. Generally, this fits well in a 4-hour program (or maybe two, 2-hour sessions.)

Facilitator Section

This section of the DVD provides support for hosts & facilitators. This includes both video and written Facilitator Guidelines with descriptions of the activities and hints for running a workshop, an activity worksheet and promotional materials. Specifically, you will find:

» A Facilitator Guidelines video (10 minutes)
» A Facilitator Guidelines document (PDF)
» A Workshop Flyer, in draft that you can modify with local details
» Workshop Announcement, in draft, that you can modify with local details
» Activity Worksheet (PDF)

Program Costs and Ordering

The cost of the DVD (including one copy of the workbook for the facilitator) is $175. Workbooks are $25 each. Both can be purchased online.

Is This Program Relevant to Your Area?

TIES TO THE LAND is a project funded and developed in Oregon, but we designed our curriculum with the intent that it be broadly relevant. Yes, tax laws and other rules and regulations are specific to a place, but family dynamics are universal. Whenever possible we avoided referencing frequently changing or locally specific regulations and focused instead on the critical issue of communication. Workshop participants and workbook users in Oregon and elsewhere must turn to additional resources for locally relevant tax and regulatory issues.

We hope these materials are useful. Please contact us if you have questions about brining TIES TO THE LAND to your area.

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