DCNR Grant Spotlight: Lower Mount Bethel Township Expands Outdoor Recreation Access; New Grant Round Opens Soon

Residents of Lower Mount Bethel and Washington Townships in Northampton County have a new place to enjoy the outdoors thanks in part to a DCNR grant.

Lower Mount Bethel Township purchased the 74-acre Meadows at Martins Creek, thanks to a DCNR contribution toward the purchase of 47 of those acres.

Grant funding came from the Keystone Recreation, Park and Conservation Fund.

“The Meadows at Martins Creek is the result of cooperative effort on the part of state, county, and local funding sources,” says John Mauser, a member of Lower Mount Bethel Township’s Board of Supervisors. “Partnerships such as this are crucial for communities like Lower Mount Bethel Township to continue to preserve open space.”

The property supports passive recreation such as hiking, birdwatching, and fishing on Martins Creek -- a designated Class A Wild Trout Stream. 

It also helps implement the vision of the Lehigh Valley Greenways Conservation Landscape, a partnership to conserve and connect ribbons of green in the Lehigh Valley.

The acquired land provides close-to-home outdoor recreation for a part of Northampton County that lacked it, according to an analysis of recreation needs in Pennsylvania done by the Trust for Public Land.

New Grant Round Opening Soon

To learn more about riparian buffer, recreation, land conservation grant opportunities, visit DCNR’s Community Conservation Partnerships Program Grant webpage. 

A new grant round will be opening January 19 and closes April 14.  Click Here to learn more.

  For more information on state parks and forests and recreation in Pennsylvania, visit DCNR’s website, Click Here to sign up for the Resource newsletter, Visit the Good Natured DCNR Blog,  Click Here for upcoming events, Click Here to hook up with DCNR on other social media-- Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Flickr.

(Reprinted from the December 23 DCNR Resource newsletter.  Click Here to sign up for your own copy.)

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[Posted: December 24, 2020]  PA Environment Digest