The Lackawanna Highlands project in northeastern Pennsylvania follows a trend across the country of vast privately owned working forests in danger of being carved up and sold as smaller parcels. This threatens to fragment valuable wildlife habitat, degrade air and water quality, cripple local economies and impede opportunities for public recreation.

Situated in the rapidly growing Wilkes-Barre/Scranton metropolitan area, the Lackawanna Highlands could have easily been developed, but with the help of The Conservation Fund, this stretch of high-quality forest has a different fate.

Our Role

With the help of the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR), the Pennsylvania Game Commission, the Richard King Mellon Foundation and our own Working Forests, we purchased nearly 11,000 acres of forestland within Lackawanna, Luzerne and Wayne counties in 2014 from Theta Land Corp. Adjacent to thousands of acres of already protected land, this new acreage protects critical land within the Chesapeake Bay watershed and gives native wildlife, such as deer, turkey and bear, more room to roam. We then transferred more than 8,000 acres of this land to the DCNR as an addition to Lackawanna State Forest, increasing its size by more than 30 percent. The Game Commission plans to purchase the remaining acreage for state game lands.

Considered the centerpiece of the Lackawanna Highlands project, this purchase completes a 10-year, multiphase effort that results in a total of 27,000 new acres of state forests, state game lands and county parks. This sizable recreational resource at city residents’ back doors provides new opportunities for camping, hiking, birdwatching, fishing, hunting and more.

Why This Project Matters

Millions of acres of forests across the country are at risk. And while that could spell disaster, it also creates an unprecedented opportunity for landscape-level conservation that we may never have again. The Conservation Fund understands the challenges of a changing forestry industry and finds innovative ways to keep this incredible natural resource working for the benefit of wildlife and people, now and in the future.