​
California Conservation Easement Database (CCED) ​
Notice for Database Manual ​
​

Before You Use CCED Data:​
​
Your use of CCED data signifies that you will abide by the guidelines below
and in the Disclaimer that follows.
CCED contains GIS data for conservation easements over public and private property. While this data is
from public records, your use of the data should make every effort to respect the privacy concerns and
sensitivities of land owners and those agencies and organizations who work with them.
1. Any maps of CCED data should show clearly that easement properties are closed to any public access,
unless CCED has specific information to the contrary. Very few easements allow public access.
2. Private land owner names are typically not included in CCED and should not be attached to CCED data
shown on maps. When labeling easement properties, users should access the generic holding name
field ease_label, use “Restricted lands”, or use an equivalent general title whenever feasible.
3. Likewise, avoid showing on maps the individual agencies or organizations who hold easements, unless
essential to your task. Instead, consider using the agency level field eholdtyp classifying the agency
as: federal, state, local, or nonprofit, to indicate the type of easement holder.
4. If specific easement boundaries are not needed for map display, use center point symbols or other
forms of abstraction.
5. CCED is provided as is, without any warranty of accuracy. CCED boundaries are as provided by various
sources and not all lands have not been enhanced to align with parcels or other GIS data. Where
CCED is missing data, please contact us at cpad@calands.org to let us know about these gaps.
CCED is suitable for a wide range of planning, assessment, analysis, and display purposes. CCED should
not be used as the basis for official regulatory, legal or other such governmental actions – these types of
uses require official land records from county recorders or easement holding agencies in the area of
focus.
Thank you for your consideration and cooperation in using and improving CCED.​

GreenInfo Network
December 2025

California Conservation Easement Database (CCED) - Version 2025b

CCED DATABASE MANUAL
Revised: December 2025
CCED 2025b saw a net increase in conservation easement acreage by 71,000 acres from our previous 2025a
release. A number of easements were parcelized to better improve data accuracy.

BEFORE USING DATA, see Data Disclaimer inside and note that:
●​ Easement lands are most frequently private property - maps must clearly show them with no
public access
●​ CCED is not suitable for property survey or other legally-binding functions – see source agency
data or County Recorder records for such information
●​ CCED data may not be the most current data for any specific agency or organization, as it is
updated less frequently
●​ Display on maps of easement holder agency/organization names and actual property names
should be avoided whenever feasible, in favor of more generic titles

For more information on CCED, go to: www.CALands.org/cced

CCED is published by GreenInfo Network
www.greeninfo.org

2

Acknowledgements​
Disclaimer​
Summary​
Disclaimer Details​
Uses​
Data Sources​
Limitation of Liability​
Acknowledgement of Indigenous and Native Lands​
Summary​
CCED 2025b – Key Statistics​
I. Introduction​
II. Data Definitions​
CCED Geography​
Conservation Easement Status and Purposes​
Easement Definition within a Parcel​
Ownership vs. Management​
No Public Access​
Parcel Boundaries​
III. Database Structure​
IV. CCED Data Dictionary​
V. CCED Data Procedures​
VI. GAP Codes​
VII. Known Issues In CCED​
VII. CCED Releases and History​
Current Release - CCED 2025b (December 2025)​
Brief History of CCED​
CCED Release History​

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Acknowledgements
GreenInfo Network staff who currently maintain CCED and created the data contained in it include:
Amanda Kochanek, Dariya Draganova, Joseph Stout, Kristina Yamamoto, Andrew Nham
For more information on CCED and CPAD (data on fee owned protected areas), visit www.CALands.org
Current funding, from 2018 to 2025, is generously provided by the California Natural Resources Agency – we
greatly appreciate this assistance.
​

1

California Conservation Easement Database (CCED)

Disclaimer
Summary
The California Conservation Easement Database (“CCED”) has been developed by GreenInfo Network for
general use in land use planning, education or other activities that do not rely upon the data for a legally
binding decision. While GreenInfo Network strives to provide the best data possible, GREENINFO
NETWORK MAKES NO REPRESENTATION OR WARRANTY AS TO ITS ACCURACY, TIMELINESS, OR
COMPLETENESS. GREENINFO NETWORK MAKES NO WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY OR WARRANTY
FOR FITNESS OF USE FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, WITH RESPECT TO THESE
PRODUCTS OR THE UNDERLYING DATA. Any user of this data, accepts same AS IS, WITH ALL FAULTS, and
assumes all responsibility for the use thereof, and further covenants and agrees to defend, indemnify,
and hold GreenInfo Network harmless from and against all damage, loss, or liability arising from any use
of this product, in consideration of GreenInfo Network having made this information available.
Independent verification of all data contained herein should be obtained by any user of these products,
or the underlying data. GreenInfo Network disclaims, and shall not be held liable for, any and all damage,
loss, or liability, whether direct, indirect, or consequential, which arises or may arise from these products
or the use thereof by any person or entity.
This edition of CCED should be cited in any maps, reports, websites or other products as: “California
Conservation Easement Database (CCED) – www.CALands.org (December 2025b)”
Disclaimer Details
This digital data and metadata, (hereinafter collectively referred to as the "information"), are provided
on an "AS IS", "AS AVAILABLE" and "WITH ALL FAULTS" basis. Neither GreenInfo Network nor any of its
employees makes any warranty of any kind for this information, express or implied, including but not
limited to any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose, nor shall the distribution
of this information constitute any warranty.
GreenInfo Network shall in no event be liable to you or anyone else for any inaccuracy, error failures,
delays or interruptions in the use of the database and shall in no event be liable to you or anyone else for
any consequential, incidental, special or tort damages arising out of or relating to the use or inability to
use the database. It is the sole responsibility of the user to determine whether or not the data is suitable
for the intended purpose.
The information is collected from various sources and will change over time without notice. GreenInfo
Network and its officials and employees assume no responsibility or legal liability for the accuracy,
completeness, reliability, timeliness, or usefulness of any of the information provided nor do they
represent that the use of any of the information will not infringe privately owned rights.
The information is not intended to constitute advice nor is it to be used as a substitute for specific advice
from a licensed professional. You should not act (or refrain from acting) based upon the information
without independently verifying the information and, as necessary, obtaining professional advice
regarding your particular facts and circumstances.
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Uses
CCED is made available without charge for a wide range of uses, for example, use by government
agencies in planning and operations, use by private consultants in the development of plans and
analyses, use by non-profit organizations and educational institutions for strategy, research, planning,
management and other functions. While agencies, organizations, individuals and businesses may
distribute free of charge copies of the data, any such replication must include this disclaimer and require
the user to review the provisions therein.
CCED may be used on computer data networks, but should not be published for public website maps
that allow users to view the data at a scale of 1:100,000 or larger.
See the attached document, “Before You Use CCED Data” for further use guidelines.
Data Sources
Data in the CCED is based on a wide range of sources within the budgets available for the data’s
development and maintenance. The source datasets have a range of publication dates, varying degrees
of accuracy, various projections, and different attribute information. Over time, and as funding allows,
some CCED boundaries will be aligned to ownership parcel boundaries, but that independent alignment
work has not been conducted for this edition. GreenInfo Network has made every effort to standardize
the multiple data inputs to create CCED, but occasional errors in this process are to be expected.
GreenInfo Network does not provide the original datasets from primary data source providers.
Limitation of Liability
IN NO EVENT WILL GREENINFO NETWORK BE LIABLE TO YOU OR ANY THIRD PARTY FOR ANY DAMAGES
ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF OR INABILITY TO USE THE DIGITAL DATA, EVEN IF GREENINFO NETWORK IS
ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
December 2025

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Acknowledgement of Indigenous and Native Lands

The GIS data in CPAD and CCED are based on land ownership or legal easements that restrict how lands
can be used. The ownership focus of the databases is intended to assist in the planning, management,
and long-term care of lands owned by government agencies and nonprofits for open space purposes.
The lands represented here are the traditional unceded territory of more than 100 nations. To learn
more about a particular territory please visit the California Native Heritage Commission’s Digital Atlas.
We recognize that the Western perspective of land ownership is limited and does not reflect an
important range of cultural views, especially of many Indigenous peoples. Furthermore, land ownership
as a structure has been used to promote empire and colonization.
These data represent only one lens of how to view California’s landscape. CPAD and CCED are not
intended to represent, replace, or negate different cultural views of lands such as spiritual ownership,
stewardship, or caretaking.
As we seek to respect the many diverse Indigenous people connected to this land from time
immemorial, we welcome feedback on how to improve and address non-Western perspectives and how
to respectfully represent them. Email us at cpad@calands.org.

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Summary
IMPORTANT: Easements are special types of protected areas, where the land can remain in private
ownership. Consequently, anyone using California Conservation Easement Database (CCED) data shall
follow these overall guidelines:
1. Any maps of CCED data should show clearly that easement properties are closed to any public access,
unless CCED has specific information to the contrary (very few easements allow public access).
2. Private land owner names are typically not included in CCED and should not be attached to CCED data
shown on maps. When labeling easement properties, users should access the generic holding name
field ease_label or use “restricted lands” or equivalent general title whenever feasible.
3. Likewise, showing on public maps the individual agencies or organizations who hold easements should
be avoided whenever feasible. Instead, consider using the agency level field eholdtyp classifying the
agency as: federal, state, local, or nonprofit, to indicate the type of easement holder.
CCED contains data about lands that are under conservation or open space easement (as opposed to
those in CPAD that are owned outright “in fee”). Easement lands are typically private property and are
only rarely open to the public. Some easements overlay publicly-owned lands, with both a fee and
easement status.
CCED easement lands range from the very small parcels in cities to large rural or wild landscapes. Uses
on these parcels may include farming, ranching, timber harvesting or open space (including use as
floodways, scenic viewsheds or for the protection of biodiversity). Easement protected lands are
sometimes parts of larger protected landscapes and sometimes they exist on their own. It is important
to note that one privately owned property may have two or more easements held by agencies or
nonprofits (“stacked” easements).
This edition of CCED inventories over 3 million acres across roughly 3,800 easements, held by over 180
agencies and nonprofits. CCED is published by GreenInfo Network (www.greeninfo.org). Access to CCED
data files is available online - see www.CALands.org for more information. CCED is available in ESRI
shape file format. Related data sets are available at www.CALands.org for fee-owned protected areas
(CPAD).
The current release is CCED 2025b, published in December 2025.
NOTE: CCED is regularly submitted to the National Conservation Easement Database (NCED –
conservationeasement.us) and is expected to become a part of their next release, though minor
differences may be present.

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CCED 2025b – Key Statistics
December 2025

IMPORTANT: The CCED dataset still contains some overlapping “stacked” polygons (see Section III.,
Database Structure below). The stacked polygons represent lands under easements held by more than
one agency, multiple funding sources, transaction dates, or other unique situations. We continue to
resolve these duplicate polygons however some overlaps remain until we are able to verify further
details about the easement. Additionally, some easements exist on land that is also in fee ownership,
and will overlap wholly or partly with land identified in CPAD, the California Protected Areas Database.
CCED statistics are provided statewide and for the top 10 easement holding agencies. Agency level
statistics are calculated using the primary easement holding agency or organization. When multiple
agencies hold an easement over the same land, the most local agency is assigned as the primary
easement holder.
●​ Total acres statewide in California = 3,058,3931
●​ Number of easement polygons = 21,717
●​ Estimated number of easement properties = 3,8132
1

Acres are estimated given data constraints. Silver and minor overlaps are estimated to total 300 acres as of the 2025b release.
Fluctuations in the number of easements since 2022a are a result of an incremental shift from single easement records to
multi-parcel easement records. This statistic should be used with caution.
2

Top 10 easement holding organizations
AGENCY/ORGANIZATION

California Rangeland Trust
The Nature Conservancy
California Department of Fish and Wildlife
United States Natural Resources Conservation Service
United States Fish and Wildlife Service
Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District
California Department of Forestry and Fire
Pacific Forest Trust
Tejon Ranch Conservancy
Wildlife Heritage Foundation

ACRES

428,899
380,341
193,784
133,125
129,413
123,421
117,281
114,802
109,014
66,192

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I. Introduction
The California Conservation Easement Database (CCED) inventories lands that have been protected
through conservation or open space easements. A separate database (CPAD – the California Protected
Areas Database) tracks open lands owned outright (“in fee”).
Conservation easements are legal restrictions created by a contract between a land owner and a
qualified agency or organization that are usually based on limiting the future uses of a property to those
compatible with open space, conservation, farming or other defined uses. Such easements reduce or
remove development opportunities on these lands. All easements in California are officially filed with
the relevant County Recorder’s office (not necessarily the Assessor’s office) and are public records data.
Some easements are acquired with public funding; others are created by landowner donations, and
many by a combination of the two. Where public funding is involved, public records describing and
mapping the property and presenting its appraisal are created.
CCED is focused on lands conserved for natural or other open space purposes and does not include all
easements. For example, it does not include utility easements or easements created for short terms.
Williamson Act and Farmland Security Zones are not included unless they have additional protections on
the land.
CCED is suitable for a wide range of planning, assessment, analysis, and display purposes. CCED should
not be used as the basis for official regulatory, legal or other such governmental actions – these types of
uses require official land records from county recorders or easement holding agencies in the area of
focus.
The lands in CCED are typically defined by the agency or organization who manages the site, and
information on the private land owner is only reported if readily available in public records and/or
reported to CCED. Some easement holders do indicate owner name in property titles (e.g., “Jones Ranch
easement”) and this source information is transferred into CCED.
Access to CCED GIS data is through a download link, see more information at CALands.org/cced. CCED is
available in ESRI shape file format.
CCED has been developed by GreenInfo Network, a non-profit technology support organization
www.greeninfo.org, with support from other non-profits, foundations and public agencies. Previous
supporters of CPAD and CCED have included: California Department of Parks and Recreation, Sierra
Nevada Conservancy, and the Coastal Conservancy. From 2012 to 2014, CCED development was
supported by a grant from the California Strategic Growth Council through the U.S. Geological Survey’s
Gap Analysis Program (GAP). Current funding, from 2018 to 2025, is generously provided by the
California Natural Resources Agency – we greatly appreciate this assistance.
NOTE ABOUT EASEMENTS ACROSS THE US: A national inventory (the National Conservation Easement
Database, or NCED) is available to track easements.

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II. Data Definitions
CCED Geography
CCED covers the entire state of California. Easement boundaries are most frequently identified by the
managing agency. Given their unique status, these boundaries may not align precisely to digital assessor
parcel boundaries. Future releases will explore options for improving alignment (see “VI. Known Issues in
CCED” below for further discussion).
Conservation Easement Status and Purposes
Lands in CCED have been identified as those with legal conservation or open space easements, typically
serving one or more of the following open space purposes:
●​
●​
●​
●​
●​
●​
●​
●​
●​

Habitat Conservation - wildlife or plant reserve protected specifically for habitat
General Open Space – open land used serving a broad range of purposes
Historical/Cultural - historic sites
Forestry - active forest harvesting, tree growth for forestry
Agriculture - crop lands including irrigated pastures
Ranching - grazing lands – grasslands, mixed forest, dry and grazing pasture
Water Supply - watersheds, waterways
Scenic area – viewscapes, etc.
Flood Control – flood plains, natural flood control channels
Easement Definition within a Parcel

Conservation easements can be placed on part of a parcel, or the entire parcel. Existing buildings,
hardscape areas, and ancillary structures may be present on the parcel. The data in this release has not
been reviewed in great detail to include or exclude portions of parcels that may not be a part of an
easement. Users should therefore exercise caution when using the data and should refer to county
recorder property records and/or the easement holding agency/organization for most current and
accurate information.
Ownership vs. Management
CCED tracks lands according to the agency that manages the easement over the property. Information on
the owner of the land is not included, nor is it planned to be included in future releases.

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No Public Access
Almost all lands in CCED should be considered Closed and not open to the public. Any maps including
easement lands must clearly and prominently indicate that these lands are Closed areas – and any
map of recreational or other public access sites/opportunities must not include easement lands.
Where easement properties are known to allow managed public use, these opportunities may be
shown, but only where they are validated with the easement holder.

Parcel Boundaries
While CPAD has generally been aligned to assessor parcel boundaries, much of the data in CCED is not. In
many cases easement boundaries from source agencies have been digitized independently of assessor
parcel data – sometimes due to accuracy issues in the assessor data, sometimes because assessor data
may not have been available when easement data was created. In addition, assessor parcels in rural
areas are not always highly accurate spatially.
Easements may also vary in their coverage of a parcel. Some easements cover an entire parcel; others
only define a portion of the parcel as an easement. An assessment of the alignment of easement edges
with CPAD lands shows it would require substantial work. Should funding be available, it will be
addressed in future releases.

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III. Database Structure

The CCED easement database is a single shapefile containing polygons. The current CCED data set
contains a mix of geographic levels. Some easements are defined by individual parcels (or pieces of
parcels), while others are dissolved groupings of parcels. Future releases of CCED will explore the
possible use of a holdings/units structure, as is implemented in CPAD, where parcels aggregate to
commonly named units in order to provide consistent definitions of parcels and aggregated easements
held by the same land owner and managing agency.
It should be noted that the source data sets used to create CCED often identify easements in different
manners. In particular, the overlap of easements when there are multiple easement holders and/or
funding sources is not consistent. CCED makes incremental attempts to standardize the data from
disparate sources, but additional work will be needed in future releases to standardize the data. For this
reason, users should exercise caution when reporting acreage statistics that may contain stacked
polygons.
The 2019 release of CCED marked a significant improvement in resolving stacked easements. Records
were reviewed to identify easements with similar geography and attributes. When an easement was
verified to cover the same land, with only minor edge differences (less than an acre and/or less than 10%
of the total easement area), stacked polygons were resolved.

Stacked polygons were resolved by:
●​ Selecting the most accurate polygon feature
●​ Assigning the most local agency as the primary easement holder
●​ Listing all other easement holders in the secondary easement holder field
●​ Providing any necessary data notes in the comments field
Scenarios we were not able to resolve were those that:
●​ Easement attributes varied significantly (name, reported size, access)
●​ Easement geometry varied significantly (shape or size)

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IV. CCED Data Dictionary

We strive to keep the core fields of CCED in alignment with NCED, allowing for the California data to
efficiently transfer into the national data set. However, not all NCED fields are included in CCED.
In the 2021a release, the data schema of CCED was refreshed to incorporate recent changes in the NCED
database schema. The table below lists the fields released in CCED, the metadata details: field alias,
domains, data type, length, and source.
Field Name

Description

e_hold_id

Unique ID for each easement database record

ease_label

Conservation Easement (text, for use in most mapping displays, rather than site name)

sitename

Site name, as reported by agency or source data

esmthldr

Primary easement holder (agency) name

eholdtyp
s_emthd1

Easement holder level: federal, state, local, NGO, or other legal classification
Any additional easement holders

e_type

Main purpose of the easement - this field is under development.

pubaccess

Identifies if an easement is: closed, restricted, or open

duration

Identifies whether the easement is permanent or term-limited (if 10+ years)

term

Numeric field noting the term of the easement

comments

Any comments from either the source, provider, or aggregator

date_est

Full date the easement was established (MM/DD/YYYY) or date of project approval.

year_est

Year easement was established (YYYY)

county

County holding is within (or mostly within)

src_attr

Source of the easement table attribute data

src_align

Source of the easement spatial geometry

iucncat

IUCN management category: Ia, Ib, II, III, IV, V, VI, N/A

nced_uid

NCED identifier (mostly unique)

eholduid1

Unique identifier by any other data providing agency

last_edit

Date of last edit MM-DD-YYYY

cced_id

CCED identifier (mostly unique) from pre 2021a releases. To be retired.

gis_acres

Easement acres, as calculated in GIS

GAP1_acres

Total acres with GAP code 1, extracted from PADUS, CDPR, and Local Agencies

GAP2_acres

Total acres with GAP code 2, extracted from PADUS, CDPR, and Local Agencies

GAP3_acres

Total acres with GAP code 3, extracted from PADUS, CDPR, and Local Agencies

GAP4_acres

Total acres with GAP code 4, extracted from PADUS, CDPR, and Local Agencies

GAP_Source

Source of GAP acres in the fields: GAP1_acres, GAP2_acres, GAP3_acres, GAP4_acres
Sum of the fields: GAP1_acres, GAP2_acres, GAP3_acres, GAP4_acres

TOT_GAP_AC

NOTE: The sum of this field may not be an exact match with gis_acres,due to
geoprocessing, differences between NCED and CCED, as well as rounding.

The field gapcat was removed in 2023a to avoid confusion with more detailed GAP code data provided as
a part of California’s 30x30 effort.

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V. CCED Data Procedures

CCED makes use of a wide range of data sources, including source agency databases, parcel data from
counties, and other research. In general, the following approach has been taken:
1.​ AGENCY SOURCE DATA: Source agency GIS data is secured for agencies, where it is available.
With hundreds of agencies and organizations having holdings in CCED, contact with each of
these is not possible However, the top 20 agencies/organizations are believed to hold over 90
percent of the easements in CCED and many have GIS data. Additionally, some easements are
defined by public data sets covering county or statewide inventories (eg, that of the Wildlife
Conservation Board - WCB). Not all agencies have contributed data to CCED. When possible,
additional research is done to define very large known easements through available public
information sources.
2.​ PARCELS AS GEOMETRIC BASE: CCED is evaluated in the context of assessor parcels and, to some
extent, the Public Land Survey System (PLSS) but is not aligned to these base data layers. The
information gathered will be used in future releases to guide a refined geometry of easements.
Easements do not always cover entire parcels, as they may exclude existing structures and
development.
3.​ CROSS-CHECK WITH CPAD: CCED is spatially reviewed in context with CPAD to try and evaluate
easement boundaries, future efforts will be required to resolve edge matching. Both gaps and
silvers occur when using CCED in conjunction with CPAD and other GIS layers.
4.​ RESOLVING CONFLICTS: Agency source data is generally considered to be authoritative in CCED.
When an easement is defined in multiple contributing data sources, data contributed directly
from the agency managing the easement is assumed to be authoritative over compiled data sets
such as WCB. Given the unique scenario of easements, additional in-depth research is often
required by data users to accurately define the easement boundaries.
5.​ AERIAL IMAGE CHECKS: As possible, 1-meter or better aerial photography is used to verify the
location of an easement. Future efforts may be taken to check boundaries against physical
features such as fence lines, roads, waterways, and physical structures. However, parcel
boundaries are accepted even if they do not perfectly align to such aerial images.
6.​ COUNTY BREAKS: Easements that span a county boundary are not split. They are assigned to the
county they have the most acreage in.
7.​ SCALE: The scale of accuracy is highly varied across the state. In general, the data is best used at
scales above 1:24,000.

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VI. GAP Codes
Starting with the 2021a release, we have included additional details about the GAP status of easements.
GAP codes are a USGS-defined metric that reflects management intent (USGS 2020, Prior-McGee 1998).
GAP codes are categorized on a scale from 1 to 4 where GAP 1 and 2 are areas primarily managed with
the intent to protect biodiversity, GAP 3 are areas managed for multiple uses including conservation,
recreation, and extraction and GAP 4 has no known mandate for biodiversity protection. Data for GAP
codes in CCED is sourced from PADUS, CDPR and Local Agencies/Organizations
Details about the geoprocessing are available through calands.org.1 It is important to understand that
the acreages reported are estimates and for that reason have been rounded using the following
methods:
Any property less than 1 acre rounds the GAP acreage to two decimal places. Properties that are 1 acre
or larger have their GAP acreage rounded down to the nearest whole numbers. This rounding helps
reduce the reporting of slivers and helps reduce the perception of higher accuracy beyond what is
significant.
We estimate the error introduced as a result of this rounding, is less than 2% of the total CCED acres.
PADUS
With a geo-spatial intersection of CCED and PADUS we assume an easement can contain acreage under
multiple GAP codes. The results of this process ultimately assign GAP codes to 26% of the acres
inventoried in CCED.
California State Parks
The inclusion of GAP codes from California State Parks cover are minimal, with less than 1% of GAP codes
being reported. This is due to most CDPR lands being held in fee title.
Local Agency/Organization
As of the 2025b release, approximately 84% of GAP codes reported in CCED have been sourced from the
group holding the easement (and/or the managing agency). Codes assigned by these groups are more
accurate and current.
Completing the GAP Inventory
While the majority of acres are assigned GAP codes by the local agency/organization, there are still a
significant number of groups we aim to gather data from. California’s 30x30 effort has, and will continue
to, offer opportunities to work with groups to define accurate GAP codes to lands they own and/or
manage.

1

Additional information on geoprocessing steps can be found at:
https://www.calands.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Method-for-Including-Gap-Codes-in-CPAD-and-CCED.pdf
13

VII. Known Issues In CCED

CCED is a developing data set and contains a number of unresolved issues.
Main issues:
1)​ Overlaps occur throughout the state and are predominantly slivers. Most often these are a result
of disagreement between county boundaries on ownership. The total acreage of overlaps is not
significant, but we do aim to resolve these over time. As of the 2024b release we now offer a
report of overlaps at each release. The zip file contains a gdb itemizing overlaps at the holding
level and a readme describing the various attributes. This can be downloaded at:
https://bit.ly/overlap_analysis
2)​ Not all agency/organization easement data is in CCED. CCED is heavily focused on easements
that are already defined by the managing agency in GIS format. Many smaller easements are not
included, as it is difficult to survey all possible easement holders across the state. Efforts are
under way to encourage all easement-holding agencies/organizations to participate in CCED. In
particular, many city and county easements are not yet included.
3)​ Alignment of easements varies greatly - some match parcel boundaries, some use physical
features of the landscape or manmade features, others are loosely defined. CCED currently
accepts any agency/organization submitted boundary as the most accurate. Future release will
attempt to improve the alignment and accuracy of easement boundaries.
4)​ Slivers will exist when using CCED in coordination with other layers such as CPAD.
5)​ Complete attributes are not always available for all easements; these are blank or specified as
“Unknown” until further information is found.
6)​ Easements have not been attributed as being on land or water.
7)​ Agencies may track multiple easement holders on one property differently. Stacked polygons are
used to indicate multiple easement holders with significant differences in the geometry and/or
attributes. For this reason, CCED users must use caution when reporting any acreage or number
easements statistics. CCED 2018 removed many duplicate easements in previous releases, and
2019 and 2024 both made significant improvements in overlapping sliver areas, but not all
easements have not been comprehensively resolved as of 2025.
8)​ Efforts to include additional information on GAP codes have been made, using data from PADUS
and NCED. However, at times, the reported acreage and overall GAP code of an easement will
differ. Some easements have areas where the GAP code is unknown, and/or areas have been
assigned multiple GAP codes.
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VII. CCED Releases and History

Current Release - CCED 2025b (December 2025)
The 2025b release of CCED includes nearly 71,000 new acres, with improvements across various
easements throughout the state. Many agencies have submitted new easements into CCED since our last
release. Here are some highlights:
The Nature Conservancy - Updated 39,790 Acres spread across 11 conservation easements.
California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection - Added 13,611 Acres. 12,000 of those acres are
part of their newly-conserved easement, Shackleford Forest.
Wildlife Heritage Foundation - Updated 10,659 Acres spread across 26 conservation easements.
CCED 2025b is another major improvement in tracking conservation easements. Between June and
December over 71,000 acres have been added. Major additions were made for many organizations,
including: The Nature Conservancy, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Wildlife
Heritage Foundation, Save the Redwoods League, Bear Yuba Land Trust, and many more. Acres added
are a mix of newly protected lands and additions of previously missing easements.
As with any large data gathering program, there are likely to be lands that have been missed, wrongly
included, or miss-attributed. If you find errors, please contact GreenInfo Network at cpad@CALands.org.
Not all inquiries can be responded to given funding constraints. However, issues and errors are logged for
future research if/when funding is available.

Brief History of CCED
CCED was developed during 2013-2014 and first published in March 2014. The dataset was created in
response to direction from the California Strategic Growth Council (SGC), which is overseeing a wide
range of planning related efforts for the state. The data has been prepared in response to frequent
requests by local, state and federal agencies and nonprofits for a more complete representation of
California’s protected landscape. Easements are a vital part of protected California’s natural resources. As
such, it is important to know their location, size and how they relate to a whole host of other features
(soil types, watersheds, flood control, habitat, etc.).
Initial efforts to track easements go back as far as the initial work on CPAD in the 1980s, mostly focused
in the San Francisco Bay Area. However, funding only became available in 2013 to try and standardize
and improve information about easements. Previously, when data on a conservation easement was
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received it was filed in a digital collection of folders and files. It was not integrated with other data on
easements, reviewed for accuracy, or researched for important attributes.
In the early 2000s, the State of California developed an initial statewide coverage of protected lands
known as the Public and Conservation Trust Lands (PCTL) database. This data included mainly state and
federal lands owned in fee, but it did include some conservation easements. It did not include: regional
lands, local lands, non-profit lands – for both fee and easements. It was last updated in 2005 and is now
a legacy data set, replaced by CPAD and CCED.
From the early 2000s to 2006 GreenInfo Network received funding from a variety of sources to advance
the CPAD content, structure and distribution. However, easement data did not receive funding and
remained stagnant until 2012. In late 2012, GreenInfo Network began a major project to improve CPAD
and create CCED, supported by a grant from the California Strategic Growth Council in collaboration with
the USGS Gap Analysis Program. See details on www.CALands.org.
In 2015, GreenInfo received funding from the California Natural Resources Agency for two years of
support for CPAD and CCED. In 2018 GreenInfo received additional funding from the California Natural
Resources Agency and the Department of Water Resources to continue improvements to the database.
Those have included the addition of easements and the migration to a multi-editor environment (in
2021).

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CCED Release History
CCED 2025b (Published December 2025) – The 2025b release of CCED includes nearly 71,000 new acres, with

improvements in 43 out of the 58 counties. Many agencies have submitted new easements into CCED since our last
release. Agencies like The Nature Conservancy, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE)
and the Wildlife Heritage Foundation among many others have contributed to CCED.
CCED 2025a (Published June 2025) – The 2025a release of CCED includes nearly 60,000 new acres, with

improvements in 56 out of the 58 counties. Many agencies have submitted new easements into CCED since our last
release.
CCED 2024b (Published December 2024) – A major update with the addition of over 300,00 acres and substantial

new lands and existing land improvements added for a number of agencies, including Sierra Foothills Conservancy,
California Rangeland Trust, Rivers and Land Conservancy, Feather River Lands Trust, San Joaquin Council of
Governments, and Northern California Regional Land Trust.
CCED 2024a (Published June 2024) – A major update with the addition of over 200,000 acres and significant new

reporting of GAP codes from easement holding agencies.
CCED 2023b – No release, 2023b was not released due to contracting and budget constraints.
CCED 2023a (Published June 2023) – 2023a was a major release with the addition of over 100,000 acres. Significant
updates were made for over 35 agencies, many as a direct result of 30x30 efforts. Database improvements were also
made to improve the accuracy and consistency of data over time.
CCED 2022b (Published December 2022) – Over 10,000 new acres were added. The majority of new easements
were a result of identifying PG&E settlement properties now under easement.
CCED 2022a (Published July 2022) – The tenth version of CCED included the addition of roughly 30,000 acres of
easements. With significant new lands added for: Feather River Land Trust, The Land Conservancy of San Luis
Obispo County, and the San Joaquin Council of Governments. 2022a also included a pilot project of adding more
detailed GAP codes for a small set of local agencies.
CCED 2021b (Published December 2021) – The ninth version of CCED included 19,000 new acres with major
additions to easements held by California Rangeland Trust, City of Elk Grove, Siskiyou Land Trust, and Yolo Land
Trust.
CCED 2021a (Published August 2021) – The eighth version of CCED included two major structural updates 1) a
technical migration of the data to a PostGIS, enabling a multi-editor environment 2) the inclusion of GAP Codes from
PADUS. It also improved in completeness with the addition of 32,500 acres mostly through the update of 10 large
easement holding agencies.
CCED 2020b (Published December 2020) – The seventh version of CCED focused on additions of newly identified
easements from Big Sur Land Trust, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, Eastern Sierra Land
Trust, Feather River Land Trust, Northcoast Regional Land Trust, Pacific Forest Trust, and the Riverside County
Regional Conservation Authority totalling over 32,500 acres. Topological errors were also resolved, aligning edges
with gaps and overlaps.
CCED 2020a (Published June 2020) – The sixth version of CCED focused on the addition of new lands (over 14,000
acres) as well as continued efforts to resolve topological errors for over 1,000 acres.

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CCED 2019 (Published November 2019) – The fifth version of CCED focuses on the addition of new lands as well as
resolving topological errors, most notable data slivers resulting in overlaps.
CCED 2018 (Published December 2018) – The fourth version of CCED is an important release, which focused on
adding new lands that totaled over 500,000 acres.
CCED 2016 (Published December 2016) – This major release included the addition of hundreds of new agencies and
over half a million new acres. Many duplicate easements were resolved and fields were improved to facilitate better
syncing with the national NCED database.
CCED 2015a (Published April 2015) – The second release of CCED was a minor release. It included the addition of
37 easements and covered 71,898 new acres. Data formats were changed, for three fields, to match NCED.
CCED 2014a (Published March 2014) – The first release of CCED, it included conservation easements held by 93
agencies/organizations covering 1.5 million acres. Initial attempts were made to standardize the data attributes,
assess edge alignment, and compile spatial data from all contributing groups. The release also defined the database
structure, documented known issues, provided a detailed user manual, and outlined a use agreement and data usage
policy for CCED.

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