In 2005 the Fund established its Japanese-American Internment Camp Preservation Initiative to acquire the lands once used as campsites to intern more than 120,000 Japanese-Americans during World War II. The sites stand today as a reminder of the injustices done to those Americans. Protecting them will leave a lasting historical legacy and ensure that our nation’s future generations have a chance to understand, appreciate and learn that the denial of civil rights is not to be repeated or forgotten.
The Conservation Fund is focusing its initial efforts on three camp sites: Tule Lake, California; Topaz, Utah; and Minidoka, Idaho. The Fund is pursuing opportunities to purchase unprotected land at the sites and to increase their level of protection through either federal legislation or national historic landmark designation.
The National Park Service (NPS) manages the federal land at the Minidoka Internment National Monument and works to promote education and interpretation about the struggle of a people caught between two countries at war. The Minidoka Relocation Center is only a fraction of the former campsite’s original 950-acre core area, however, and NPS was not able to expand the property because available lands were outside the authorized boundary of the monument.
Enter The Conservation Fund, which worked with willing landowners to acquire an 128-acre property that was originally part of Minidoka. In April 2008, Congress passed a public lands bill authorizing the expansion of the Minidoka Internment National Monument, allowing the Fund to convey the property to the National Park Service.
This legislation was pushed forward by the Idaho Congressional delegation in partnership with the Washington state Congressional delegation and Friends of Minidoka. The bipartisan boundary expansion legislation was signed into law in May, a major step forward in the process to conserve this land as part of the Minidoka Internment National Monument.
The expansion will allow the park service to reconstruct an entire barracks block at the monument, which will serve as the focal point for education and visitor use.
In one of the largest land conservation projects in New York state history, the Fund and its partners protected 257,000 acres of forestland - conserving sensitive wildlife habitat, protecting water quality and benefiting the Adirondack Region’s economy.
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From government agencies to corporations, from private landowners to land trusts and local communities, the Fund's partners seek our expertise to:
Powered by: Phase2 TechnologyThe Conservation Fund National Office
1655 N. Fort Myer Drive, Suite 1300
Arlington, Virginia 22209-2156
Phone: 703-525-6300
Fax: 703-525-4610
Email: postmaster@conservationfund.org
