U.S. Fish & Wildlife ServiceThis layer represents forest resource priorities in the Highlands region. This layer is intended to inform grant proposals for the Highlands Conservation Act. The Highlands Conservation Act authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to provide financial assistance to the States of Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania (Highland States) to preserve and protect high priority conservation land in the Highlands region. This layer ranges from 0 to 14 (with 14 being highest priorities for forest conservation in the region). The layer prioritizes areas that are important for forest connectivity (using the UMassDSL forest connectivity layer), high forest carbon storage in 2050 (using the TNC forest layer), and part of large core forest blocks (using Housatonic Valley Association's forest core layer). Forest cores and forest landcover in townships with less than 14.7% forest cover are also up-ranked (based on NLCD 2021).ArcGIS ImageMapLayerhttps://hub.arcgis.com/datasets/ca9d0331a015460abd0c9833e925bbbdengU.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Open DataPublicForest Resource Priorities in the Highlands Region [United States]Web servicesUnited StatesLast Modified: 2024-09-26