The Tribune

BILLIONAIRE Louis Bacon has been recognised by a conservation organisation for his efforts to preserve and protect land, wildlife and a way of life increasingly threatened by urban development.

The award came on August 4 when the non-profit Peconic Land Trust, created in 1983 to conserve working farms and natural lands on Long Island in New York, celebrated its 30th anniversary and nearly 11,000 acres protected by honouring “the conservation legacy of the Louis Bacon family” along with the memory of the late Peter Salm and the Salm family’s ongoing efforts.

Both families, the Trust said, helped preserve land and a lifestyle where increasing urban development threatened open spaces, productive farms, watersheds, woodlands and beach-front living, potentially displacing the very magnets that drew city dwellers to Long Island’s many towns to escape the hustle and bustle of city life.

“The Trust’s professional staff carries out the necessary research and planning to identify and implement alternatives to outright development,” said its president John vH Halsey, adding that it could not accomplish its goal of “protecting the unique rural heritage of the region” without the assistance and support of families like the Bacons and the Salms.

Both families were honoured at a celebratory luncheon with dignitaries, civic and business leaders in Southampton.

In January, Mr Bacon received the Audubon Society’s highest award, the Audubon Medal, joining past recipients that included Walt Disney, Rachel Carson, Ted Turner, Jimmy Carter and the Rockefeller family.

In April, Forbes magazine recognised him as one of the world’s 10 greenest billionaires.

Both honours drew the attention of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who also praised Bacon for joining the city and the National Park Service for the future restoration of 10,000 acres of parkland in Jamaica Bay, Queens.

“Raised as an avid outdoorsman, even as a young man Louis developed a reverence for the natural world,” Mayor Bloomberg said. “His lifelong passion for land and water conservation has benefitted many communities where his conservation efforts have made a real difference to those who live, work and vacation in those places, including here in New York.”