Open Space or Affordable Housing? 2025 Kingsbury Browne Awardee Steve Rosenberg Says We Don’t Have to Choose
In the United States, average home values have nearly doubled in the past decade. As demand for homes most people can afford remains high, supply has been unable to keep pace. This shortage of affordable homes is matched by rising demand and need for open space to support biodiversity, climate resilience, food production and recreation, especially in urban areas. These two urgent issues are often viewed as being in competition with each other. But increasingly, practitioners from the affordable housing and conservation sectors are identifying shared interests and forging alliances that advance their efforts simultaneously.
Steve Rosenberg, co-convener of the Hudson Valley Alliance for Housing & Conservation (HVAHC) and the recipient of the 2025 Kingsbury Browne Award from the Land Trust Alliance and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, is a leader in this space. His work in the Hudson Valley region is redefining community planning to deliver sustainable, efficient, and equitable futures and acknowledges the critical role of both affordable homes and land conservation in realizing that outcome.
“A healthy community needs to have conserved land that provides clean water and fresh food and habitat and climate resilience,” said Rosenberg. “But [it] also needs to have housing that ordinary people can afford.”
Rosenberg identified this need after decades working to support Hudson Valley communities through conservation
Rosenberg saw conflicts between conservation and housing play out in communities across New York’s Hudson Valley for years. He began working for the conservation and advocacy organization Scenic Hudson in 1990 and retired from his role as senior vice president of Scenic Hudson and Executive Director of the Scenic Hudson Land Trust in 2021. During his time there, he began exploring the idea of forging partnerships between housing and conservation groups. After he left Scenic Hudson, he turned his full attention to that mission.
With new time on his hands, Rosenberg teamed up with Rebecca Gillman Crimmins, senior vice president of real estate and development for the Institute for Community Living, to launch the HVAHC. Rosenberg brought decades of experience and relationships in the land conservation community and Gillman Crimmins provided the same from the affordable housing side. Together, they formed a highly effective team.
The goal of the HVAHC is to unite organizations across sectors to strengthen biodiversity and climate resilience while also providing affordable places for New Yorkers to live. It is accomplishing this in several ways, beginning with the formation of an initial group of organizations working in six counties in urban, suburban, and rural settings. This pilot group initially consisted of ten organizations—and has since grown to 16—with equal representation from both sectors.
With facilitation by the Consensus Building Institute—a nonprofit that enables collaboration among organizations—the initial group shared information about their mission-based values and goals to identify potential overlap and to explore each side’s perceptions of the other. Initially, fiscal sponsorship and technical support were provided by the housing and neighborhood planning program Regional Plan Association.
Land conservation and affordable housing are more aligned than many practitioners understand
Through this process, the groups found that people from organizations in each sector were uninformed or misinformed about each other’s work. Outdated ideas about affordable housing development were prevalent. “It’s these large towers in the park that were built in maybe the 60s and 70s [that people imagine], but that’s nothing like what contemporary affordable housing is,” Rosenberg said. “Similarly, the housing groups didn’t really understand the arc of a conservation project.”
In reality, Rosenberg said, affordable housing and conservation organizations often have highly compatible interests. “They [land conservation and affordable housing] are actually very well aligned, and by working together, debunking the myths of the past and seeking on-the-ground collaborations, we can actually accomplish both objectives together, in tandem,” said Rosenberg.
Affordable housing developments tend to have certain characteristics that make them more complementary to conservation than market rate developments. “They typically do check all of the boxes of what planners and land-use folks think of as smart growth,” said Rosenberg. Affordable housing developments are typically planned for lots that are adjacent to already developed areas with preexisting water and sewer infrastructure, reducing environmental disruption and further landscape fragmentation. They tend to be compact and located in walkable areas, minimizing negative climate impacts. And they often rely on subsidies that require the developers to use energy efficient strategies and green building materials.
To serve both interests in tandem, conservationists need to deepen their mission
For conservation to better align itself with housing, Rosenberg encouraged practitioners to explore their perception of community centered conservation and to begin viewing land trusts as community members with the same responsibilities and interdependencies as any other. “That begins to create a different sense of relationship and responsibility that the organization can incorporate into its conservation planning,” said Rosenberg. “Think about the millions of people living in vulnerable locations due to the impacts of climate change. Could conservation groups also help to identify less vulnerable places for them to live that won’t compromise significant conservation resources?”
David Hindin, former enforcement attorney, manager, and executive at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, called this process a “deepening of the conservation mission.” He noted that, while Rosenberg did have to pivot from his previous work at Scenic Hudson to begin leading the HVAHC, the practices, mission, and contexts are familiar. “He’s still doing stuff that relates to the land … The commonality is that you are still using land for long-term public benefits that the for-profit market doesn’t recognize very well.” Recognizing this, other practitioners may realize that partnering with affordable housing colleagues does not mean venturing from their own mission but rather seeing the ways in which that partnership serves it.
The HVAHC wants to share its model widely
While community values are the foundation for his work, Rosenberg has been generous in sharing his expertise outside the Hudson Valley. Katie Michels, director of partnerships for the Conservation Finance Network, met Rosenberg through her work supporting a colloquium on community land trusts convened by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy in 2022 and said she has written to him many times since for his advice in supporting housing and conservation collaboration.
“I really appreciate that it seems like he’s entered a stage in his career where he’s willing to share his time and his expertise and his knowledge both in the place where he lives and to be part of this [wider] initiative,” said Michels. “He’s really willing to share their [HVAHC’s] success so as to inspire folks in other places to do similar work.”
Though it is designed to be transferable, HVAHC’s regional model must be adapted to individual communities’ contexts and partnerships face enduring challenges
Even with biases and misconceptions out of the way, collaboration faces challenges. One of these is funding. Each sector has spent decades pushing for and designing new funding mechanisms, but most exist in siloes. A grant, subsidy, or tax credit for a conservation project is unlikely to allow its recipients to collaborate with housing developers. Similarly, funding for housing often will not allot funds to protect abutting open space.
Some communities are beginning to develop solutions. In 2000, Massachusetts passed the Community Preservation Act (CPA), a state law that allows communities to conduct a referendum to place a surcharge on local property taxes. The resulting funds are then matched by a statewide Community Preservation Trust Fund and are used to support recreational areas, open spaces, affordable housing development and historic building preservation. In 2025, 201 towns have adopted CPAs and the tool has generated $3.4 billion statewide. The outcomes are 37,877 acres of preserved open space, 4,000 outdoor recreation projects, 13,300 new housing units, and more.
It is important to note that, while the CPA has the potential to enable collaborative housing and land conservation projects, it is not always used in that way. For years, housing has been significantly underrepresented in CPA projects and, at times, expansion or protection of open space and historic buildings has pushed out opportunities for needed housing development.
New York State has authorized some communities to establish Community Preservation Funds, which are supported by a small real estate transfer tax applied to select property sales. These fund conservation, but not housing, so a few towns also were able to secure authorization from the state to create Community Housing Funds. The two tools can complement each other to support comprehensive community planning.
“Now those communities are beginning to generate resources so that they can plan for and implement projects with some of their own resources to help acquire land, reduce construction costs, bring in infrastructure, conserve the parcel next door, whatever their particular objectives are,” said Rosenberg.
With laws and resources differing among communities, it is important for leaders to provide adaptable tools for land trust and housing collaboration. Michels said Rosenberg is attentive to this. “He’s not a cookie cutter sort of person,” she said. When he speaks about his work, he discusses local and regional specifics and considers the nuances of what may or may not be transferable.
Leveraging municipal planning to make room for housing and conservation
The HVAHC has also leveraged the community planning process to further this work. In New York, municipalities develop comprehensive plans, documents that illustrate a community’s vision for future development and land-use, including zoning ordinances, resident preferences, and other policy considerations.
Rather than planning housing and conservation independently, and assigning each conflicting high priority status, HVAHC is partnering with a law school, state environmental agency, and civic research organization to support one community to develop a road map to integrate the two. The strategy anticipates potential conflicts and identifies areas where the two sectors can collaborate to leverage resources and accomplish shared goals.
Progress in this space is built on forged trust; as both sides face mounting pressure, joining hands makes them stronger
Over the past several years, Rosenberg said that one of the greatest advancements that has been made in enabling synergy between the two sectors is the breadth of relationships and trust forged between affordable housing developers and conservationists. Today, the conservationists in HVAHC know who to call when they come across a property that is not the right fit for conservation, but that may work well for their partners in affordable housing.
Many donors who reach out to land trusts do so to provide community benefit and access tax incentives. Often, they can achieve the same outcomes by donating the parcel to an affordable housing group. Where in the past a land trust may simply have declined a parcel that did not fit with its work, now it might call up trusted colleagues in affordable housing. These ties ensure that donations or other opportunities for land to work toward the greater social good are not squandered.
An example of such a collaboration occurred in one Hudson Valley town, when a conservation group in the HVAHC introduced a property owner to one of HVAHC’s housing groups to help create affordable units on a property located in the community’s center.
The pilot project: Red Hook farm
This first project that HVAHC members collaborated on began in 2023 and involved a 109-acre property that went up for sale in the historically agricultural town of Red Hook, New York. The parcel was mostly farmland, but about 12 acres lay within the village itself. Thus, as a single unit, the property did not lend itself well to either conservation or housing and the cost of the purchase would have been prohibitive to groups from either side.
The Alliance helped forge a partnership among the Town of Red Hook, the regional conservation and advocacy organization Scenic Hudson, the Dutchess Land Conservancy and the regional affordable housing group RUPCO. The town purchased the farm in fee, while the two land trusts collaborated to help fund the cost of, and hold a conservation easement on, the property. The 12 acres within the village were strategically left out of the easement and set aside for affordable housing. The conserved area was sold to an organic farm operator, and the remainder will become the site of 40 new workforce housing units. Demonstrating cross-sector support for the project, all ten of the original participating HVAHC organizations submitted a letter of support for state infrastructure funding for the housing component.
The project created a replicable model for future projects and proved that communities can pursue affordable housing and conservation simultaneously. It also garnered visibility, which was beneficial to the organizations involved and to the greater movement.
The case is also exemplary for the setting in which it occurred. Many urban areas have community land trusts, nonprofit organizations that hold land on behalf of multiple community interests, including conservation and affordable housing. But Rosenberg said that the model has significant potential in rural and suburban settings, particularly in agricultural regions where workforces are dwindling, in part due to the lack of housing that is affordable. As one generation retires from farming, the next is unable to afford the same lifestyle due to rising land and housing costs. While many factors impact farm feasibility, efforts like the HVAHC could begin to help make farming viable again in these communities.
New opportunities are emerging to catalyze this work
Clear views of the need for and actual impact of affordable housing are important for its political future
As land-use challenges become increasingly pressing, Rosenberg said several opportunities are arising. First, as the groups in the HVAHC begin to communicate about these issues with their boards, constituents, and public officials, awareness around the housing affordability crisis is rising. As people continue to learn about affordable housing and to correct misconceptions around what its role is in a community, the social and political forces against it may ease. This could also be helped along as people see conservationists and housing advocates working harmoniously.
More people are coming together to consider overlap in affordable housing and conservation
Academia is also advancing thought leadership around collaborative housing and land conservation. In 2022 the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy hosted the Colloquium on Conservation and Community Land Trusts at its office in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Hindin and Michels, then a graduate student at Yale University studying land conservation, land stewardship, and rural community development, co-authored the working paper “Building Collaboration Among Community Land Trusts Providing Affordable Housing and Conservation Land Trusts Protecting Land for Ecological Value,” which informed the event.
The Land Trust Alliance may eventually serve as a platform for national affordable housing and conservation peer groups
Rosenberg is also collaborating with Hindin and environmental attorney Gabe Ross to launch a national peer group of land trusts interested in working with affordable housing groups. Hindin and Ross hosted a session at the 2024 Land Trust Alliance Rally, which attracted an audience of about 80 people. Currently, the three are working on developing a more permanent version of this group, potentially assisted by the Land Trust Alliance, which would share resources and convene virtually on a regular basis.
Though Rosenberg is a thought leader, he stands on the shoulders of those before him
Importantly, Rosenberg acknowledged that his work is built on a movement that has been underway for many years. “There are organizations around the country who’ve been working in this space for a long time and doing successful projects and their work is very inspiring,” he said.
One such example is the Athens Land Trust (ALT) in Georgia. The ALT was founded in 1994 on the premise of protecting land for both conservation and housing. Since then, it has emerged as a leader in this space.
The future of the movement depends on strong relationships
Moving forward, the land trust community is well equipped to expand this work. “One of the things land trusts pride themselves on, and frankly are excellent at, is building relationships with people of all stripes,” said Rosenberg. “They couldn’t do their work successfully if they weren’t able to build relationships with all different kinds of people on the ground.”
Rosenberg’s own success is rooted in trust-building and an open mind
Rosenberg’s own propensity for trust building is one of the characteristics that Hindin said makes him so effective in this work. “In the Hudson Valley, he had credibility and relationships. He’s diplomatic and very positive,” said Hindin. He also noted that Rosenberg lives in and is active within the community his work impacts.
In addition, Michels noted a creative aspect to Rosenberg’s workflow. “He both has very deep expertise and also seems to have a beginner’s mind and openness,” said Michels. “He has this beautiful mix of having a very solid and distinguished career and background, yet also seems to be really open to new ideas and new ways of doing things or learning about things. That balance is pretty remarkable.”
The trust-building skills Rosenberg and other conservationists have developed translate well to the context of fostering partnerships between conservationists and affordable housing leaders. “A sort of natural extension of that, especially in a time like this where community connectedness is fraying,” said Rosenberg. “Is to think about building relationships using the same skills with other organizations in other sectors whose work and values align with [conservation goals].”
Rosenberg said conservationists have nothing to lose by investing in these relationships. “There’s nothing but upside potential there in terms of filling gaps and broadening our constituencies.” He acknowledged a common concern among some land trusts’ board members that collaboration will cost them funding and muddy the picture of their mission. “I think there’s equal, if not greater, opportunity to broaden their constituencies and attract other funders who understand increasingly the importance of both [housing and conservation] to creating healthy communities.”
When partnerships between the two sectors will become mainstream is dependent on many factors, but most of all, the ability of people to come together over shared goals. As Hindin put it, “this work moves at the speed of trust.”
Steve Rosenberg is the recipient of the 2025 Land Trust Alliance Kingsbury Browne Distinguished Practitioner Award and will join the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy as its 2025-2026 Kingsbury Browne Distinguished Practitioner, where he will explore his work further and develop resources to share with the community of practice. To learn more about Rosenberg and the award, read the press release here.