Island Stewards: Our Mission

Important Notice:  Please see the Island Steward Alert below before visiting Vaughn's Island!

Kennebunkport Conservation Trust - Island Steward Program's mission is to promote better use, responsibility, and understanding of these special islands through stewardship management.

At a time when environmental challenges are great and successes often seem few, it is important to celebrate victories and achievements. The Kennebunkport Conservation Trust's (KCT) decision to place 12 of its islands on the Trail this spring represents just such an accomplishment-a triumph of minds coming together to share and protect natural places on the coast of Maine.

Although MITA and KCT started our discussions about the Cape Porpoise islands just last year, this agreement has really been several decades in the making. Since 1988, MITA has been building a reputation for stewardship that has made it a desirable conservation partner for island owners up and down the coast. Meanwhile, since 1973, KCT has been doing its utmost to preserve properties with important wildlife and scenic value within the town of Kennebunkport. Our decision to join forces has been a natural outgrowth of our shared interest in promoting responsible public access to the land.

The price for keeping the islands "open" is not high, but it does take commitment. More good people are needed to understand the needs of the land, and to help manage it for preservation and enjoyment by all living creatures. Bob Haskell, program director for the KCT Island Steward program does his part to assure that there will be enough stewards to meet the need. In training classes, he schools KCT volunteers in the "Leave No Trace" ethic. Then, in a field-based setting, he imparts some basic skills and techniques for managing the land.

KCT has two levels of volunteers that are roughly analogous to MITA's monitor skippers and adopters. The "True Stewards" work on a set schedule and are responsible for their assigned areas whenever they are on duty. Boatmanship and seamanship skills are taught and some familiarity with the islands is helpful. The "Observers" are a less formalized but equally important type of volunteer. They will observe the land, while passing by in a boat or hiking on their own time, and pass on information important for its management. They will shadow with veteran stewards on their monitoring runs.

Why all this effort? There are plenty of good reasons, of course, but I like Bob Haskell's reasoning the best. "I take my twelve year old daughter out to enjoy the islands," he told me. "When I can teach her to look out her back door, without traveling hundreds or thousands of miles away, when she can appreciate what lives under a rock or what's in a shell, then I've done something very valuable. I'm giving her something special. That's our future."

Exerpt from "Partnership on Cape Porpoise" by Jay Miller