By Brian Roewe for Earthbeat.
Broadcast version by Nadia Ramlagan for Kentucky News Connection for the Solutions Journalism Network-Public News Service Collaboration.

The region in central Kentucky where the Sisters of Loretto have resided for 200 years is often described as "holy land." Now, more than 650 acres of that land surrounding their motherhouse will be protected and preserved permanently under the terms of a new conservation easement.

The arrangement, signed Jan. 18 with the Bluegrass Land Conservancy, will place more than 80% of the congregation's nearly 800 acres of land in Nerinx, Kentucky, under an easement, a legally binding and voluntary agreement that restricts development for conservation purposes and mandates current and future owners to abide by the outlined terms. The protected lands include 110 acres of cropland, 242 acres of pasture and hayfields, and 265 acres of woodlands.

Approximately 654 acres in all, the newly preserved area of farm fields, forest, native grasses, lakes and creeks is more than six times larger than the Vatican City State.

"The Loretto Community has long been committed to caring for Earth," Sr. Barbara Nicholas, Loretto president, said in a statement.

The decision, decades in the making, is part of the Loretto Sisters' participation in the Laudato Si' Action Platform, a Vatican initiative that lays out steps for individual Catholics and institutions to implement the sustainable lifestyles and integral ecology articulated in Pope Francis' 2015 encyclical, "Laudato Si', on Care for Our Common Home."

At a signing ceremony Jan. 18, Nicholas noted that Laudato Si' reminds us that humans are a part of nature, not separate from it. "Our commitment to peace and justice, to learning and teaching, extends not only to Earth but is rooted in our understanding that we are of Earth."

She also connected the conservation effort to the congregation's constitution, which ends with the words, "Let Loretto be Loretto forever."

"It is our responsibility to protect our sacred Motherhouse lands; doing so ensures that these waters, forests and grasslands will be protected into perpetuity, providing cleaner water and air for all," Nicholas said.

Jessie Hancock, executive director of the Bluegrass Land Conservancy, called the 650 acres "a significant tract of land," and one of the larger conservation efforts among the 32,600 acres the conservancy has helped permanently protect.

The conservancy will act as steward of the easement and perform annual checks to ensure its terms are not violated. As part of the agreement, the Loretto Sisters paid a one-time fee of $10,000; in addition, they are responsible for managing the land, including any conservation efforts, under the terms laid out in the easement.

Hancock said that the Loretto Sisters' decision to preserve their land was "incredibly important."

"For the local community there, I think it's a wonderful example and opportunity," she told EarthBeat.

Since 1812, the Loretto Sisters have called this corner of Kentucky home, an area in Marion County often referred to as "the Holy Land" due to the many religious communities that settled there in the 18th and 19th centuries. Of the Loretto community's 267 members, about 60 sisters and seven co-members currently reside at the motherhouse.

The question of preserving land for the future has been considered more in recent years by numerous congregations of Catholic women and men religious. From New York to the Midwest, they have established easements of their own and other preservation methods to ensure their lands endure even past their own communities' time.

For the Lorettos, discussion of ways to preserve their land for future generations began decades ago in the early 1980s. At the time, land trusts were fairly new and few were thinking about conservation in that way, said Jessie Rathburn, a Loretto co-member and the community's Earth education and advocacy coordinator who worked on the conservation easement.

Attention to the future of the sisters' land ramped up in 2013, after fossil fuel companies sought to build the Bluegrass Pipeline across their property, including possible use of eminent domain. The Loretto Sisters, alongside the Dominican Sisters of Peace in St. Catherine and Sisters of Charity at Nazareth, joined others in their community to resist the project, at times with musical protests, and in 2014 successfully blocked the pipeline, which sought to transport liquefied gasses extracted through hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, from Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia through Kentucky and eventually to the Gulf Coast.

"It was at that point that people really started thinking again about what can we do to protect our lands," Rathburn told EarthBeat, with sisters also eager to protect a recently established nature preserve cemetery from development down the road.

Conversations about the six-acre cemetery led the sisters to consider a more encompassing preservation approach. A committee was appointed in 2018 to examine options for conservation, including selling off land to establish a state park.

As the sisters surveyed the various land trusts in the region, they also learned more about the rapid loss of farmland like theirs in Kentucky and across the country. According to the American Farmland Trust, in the past two decades alone, and in Kentucky, more than 800,000 acres of farmland were converted for real estate development between 1992 and 2012.

A desire to keep their lands open to farming led the Lorettos to the Bluegrass Land Conservancy, which specializes in working with family farms.

"They wanted to make sure that the land could be used and they could keep providing services to the community and to the larger world at hand," Hancock said.

The Loretto community has farmed the land at its motherhouse since 1824. Today, a farm staff with two full-time farmers raises cattle and grows vegetables and seasonal crops like sweet corn, soybeans and pumpkins. They plan to add chickens this year. The food is used in the motherhouse kitchen and also sold in the local community.

The sisters remain "very involved," Rathburn said, in how the land is managed and are always eager to learn when a new calf is born.

The easement specifies that the farmland must remain available to agricultural use. In addition, the forest cannot be torn down for farming purposes, and the property must remain free of residential or commercial development that would interfere with its woodlands, watersheds and streams. Not only to protect those ecosystems and species that call it home, but also so that people can "see that open space and appreciate the beauty," Rathburn said.

Among the land left out of the easement is the 30-acre motherhouse campus that includes the church, convent and nursing home. Another 75 acres was designated for future needs — whether for the Lorettos or the land's next owners — for instance, housing for migrant farmworkers.

The conservation easement is the latest step by the Loretto Sisters to care for creation. They were among the first Catholic institutions to divest from fossil fuels, voting unanimously as a congregation in July 2015, a month after Laudato Si' was released. A land ethic statement guides their farming and conservation practices, prioritizing non-GMO seeds, renewable energy, open grazing for cattle and regenerative agricultural principles. A 2018 resolution to mitigate the congregation's contributions to climate change helped pave the way for the land conservation.

"This is one step that we have taken. There are many more steps that will come in our future," Rathburn said.

More farmers and landowners are considering easements as they age and consider what may come next for their land after they're gone, Hancock said. That also includes religious communities. The Bluegrass Land Conservancy has worked with other religious groups in recent years, including the establishment of an easement at St. Catherine's farm in December. Hancock hopes the example of the Lorettos will inspire more faith-based communities to consider similar options with their own land property.

Learning about land conservation has also led the Lorettos into conversation with local Native American tribes, including the Osage Nation, about their history and a possible ongoing relationship with the land where the motherhouse is located.

For Rathburn, seeing the easement signed held special significance.

Before beginning work with the Lorettos about a decade ago, she helped manage an urban farm in Denver that grew food for the neighborhood and local restaurants and markets, as well as some nearby public schools. But the farm was eventually overtaken by development with Denver's rapid growth, paved over to become a parking garage. "A true heartbreak," Rathburn recalled.

Days after the easement papers were signed, as she walked with her foster children through the woods at the motherhouse, she told them, "These woods are always going to be here. They're always going to be woods."

"It's an incredible event knowing not only that it's protected today, but ... that generations of people will be able to grow food here, that generations will learn about ecology and will feel this kinship with Earth."


Brian Roewe wrote this article for Earthbeat.


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The chair of the Federal Trade Commission will be in rural Iowa this weekend to hear from farmers and other residents about the proposed sale of Iowa Fertilizer to Koch Industries.

The sale is pending FTC approval. Iowa spent $500 million to build an Iowa Fertilizer factory in Weverly to create competition in an already consolidated industry.

Aaron Lehman, president of the Iowa Farmers Union, said he plans to tell FTC Chair Linda Khan a sale to Koch Industries would backtrack on any competitive progress the state has made.

"Our concern is that an industry that already lacks competition and has all sorts of monopoly problems would only get worse if this sale is allowed to go through," Lehman explained.

Koch and other corporate ag conglomerates have said consolidating allows them to provide better products to farmers more efficiently. The hearing is set for Saturday on Main Street in Nevada.

In addition to reducing competition for fertilizer, Lehman argued the sale would increase prices for farmers, and ultimately mean higher food prices for Iowans. He wants Khan to hear stories firsthand, from the people on the ground in Nevada.

"We know that we might not be able to have a dialogue with the people who are investigating this situation, because they need to be impartial," Lehman acknowledged. "But our farmers need to tell their story about how the industry is already in a monopoly state."

Some 18 other ag organizations have joined the Iowa Farmers Union calling on the FTC and the Justice Department to investigate the proposed sale.

A farm group is helping Iowa agriculture producers find ways to reduce the amount of nitrogen they use on their crops.

Excess nitrates can wind up in ground and surface water, and cause health problems.

Practical Farmers of Iowa is encouraging farmers to find just the right amount of nitrogen they need for their crops - while avoiding applying too much, which the group says is common.

PFI's Field Crops Viability Coordinator - Chelsea Ferrie - said thanks to federal grants and private funding, the group will pay farmers up to $35 for every acre that has a lower than normal yield if they didn't apply enough nitrogen.

"No cost to the farmer, either," said Ferrie. "We're trying to help incentivize them. This is something that farmers want to do - I mean, they want to be good stewards of the land - but also, that they need to have a profitable farm."

The application period for the program is open through the end of April.

To help them reach the right nitrogen balance, Ferrie said PFI will help farmers on the front end of the process, too - so they aren't left guessing how much to apply.

"Talk through what your typical fertilizer plan is, and what your reduction plan would be," said Ferrie. "Then you would implement this year, going into the spring and into the season."

Farmers have relied on nitrogen-based fertilizers for generations - but when applied in excess, nitrates run off into ground and surface water, posing health concerns for animals and people.




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Pesticides are still common in agriculture. Organic producers who avoid them have seen ups and downs in pushing for stronger regulations, and they point to a South Dakota example of the harm associated with widespread use among neighboring farms.

At the heart of the regulatory fight is the application of the weed-killing pesticide dicamba, and how it can drift from one farm to another. Last month, a federal court blocked "over the top" spraying of dicamba products, but the EPA followed with an order to allow the spraying of existing supplies.

Glenn Pulse, co-owner of an organic farm in Vermillion, said a 2017 drift incident had a big impact on his operation.

"Our entire farm was covered. We lost a lot of livestock, and thousands of bees were killed," he explained.

It also resulted in health concerns for his family, having to regain his organic farmer certification, and a legal battle over restitution. Groups such as the National Family Farm Coalition have been fighting what they call the deregulation of these chemicals, arguing the drift and runoff effect has damaged millions of crops.

Dicamba-manufacturing companies deny responsibility, instead blaming farmers who apply it for not following guidelines.

The EPA has said there were already millions of gallons of dicamba in circulation prior to the court's ruling, prompting the agency's order. Pulse feels there are farmers who are careful in spraying chemicals, but he wants stronger enforcement against those he describes as "loose cannons."

"The guys that are not following the labels and they're spraying in weather conditions that are not favorable, that is where, I would say, 90% of the problems are happening with drift incidents," Pulse said.

His calls for better responses to these incidents coincide with policy demands to heavily restrict dicamba products. Meanwhile, Rep. Dusty Johnson, D-South Dakota, is the main sponsor of a bill supporters say would assure uniformity in national pesticide labeling under federal law. But opponents argue it would limit longstanding state and local pesticide safety rules.