Beyond being good news for Baxter State Park, the multimillion-dollar donation that follows the park’s acquisition of Katahdin Lake further emphasizes the wisdom of coupling land and easement purchases with the funds to maintain and manage the property.

Last week, the park received $2.7 million from Frank Trautman of Rockport to create a new endowment. The money was left over from Mr. Trautman’s donation of his property on Islesboro to help fund the addition of Katahdin Lake to the park. The retired businessman gave his 58-acre property on the island to The Trust for Public Land, the organization leading the fundraising for the $14 million Katahdin Lake purchase. The Trust sold the property for $6 million, using most of the money to help pay for the Katahdin Lake purchase. The remaining $2.7 million was put into an account to be used to help manage Baxter State Park.

Although the addition of Katahdin Lake to the park will add some expense, the new money is not solely for that purpose.

When he created the park, Gov. Percival Baxter wanted it to remain free of legislative meddling, so he provided an endowment for its management. That fund now totals about $70 million. The park also gets money from timber harvesting and entrance and camping fees. Because park use is down about 25 percent from a decade ago, fee income is down, leading to heavier reliance on endowment and timber revenue.

In recent years, the state’s Bureau of Parks and Lands has required that easements it acquires come with endowments to pay for monitoring to ensure the terms of the easement are met. The Land for Maine’s Future program and federal programs that help pay for easement purchases also emphasize the need for monitoring funds. However, LMF and federal funds can only be used for purchases, not monitoring, leaving endowment building to private fundraising.

A law enacted this year requires that all easement holdings be reported to the State Planning Office as a way for mapping where all these holdings are. A requirement that these properties be monitored was stripped from the bill due to concerns that many organizations that hold easements could not afford to pay for monitoring.

While large entities, such as Baxter State Park, the Forest Society of Maine and the Appalachian Mountain Club can raise and set aside funds to monitor and maintain easement property, local land trusts may not.

The state and conservation groups have made a lot of progress. Ensuring funds are set aside to make certain preserved land is not abused by wayward recreationists, timber trespassers or developers would improve the value of conservation purchases.