Since urbanization at Tahoe began accelerating in the 1960s, large areas have been subdivided and thousands of individual lots have been sold.

When the Conservancy began its acquisition program in 1985, it identified between 6,000 and 7,000 undeveloped parcels as environmentally sensitive, out of a total of 15,000 privately-owned undeveloped parcels on the California side of the basin.

Since then, the Conservancy has undertaken a comprehensive acquisition program to acquire as many of these parcels as possible, on a willing-seller basis.

As part of this program, the Conservancy is cooperating with the U.S. Forest Service and other public agencies to assist them, through grants or land exchanges, in also acquiring environmentally sensitive lands.

The Conservancy's program is one of the largest acquisition efforts involving small individually owned subdivided lots ever undertaken for environmental protection purposes by the State of California. Moreover, it is unique in attempting to reclaim environmentally sensitive lands in already developed areas.

While the program's major thrust is to acquire, protect, and if necessary restore as much environmentally sensitive land as possible, to help protect the clarity of Tahoe's waters, a further value has been to provide an equitable alternative to owners of such lands who have been prevented by land use regulations from developing their property as they might have desired.

From 1985 to the present, the Conservancy has authorized the expenditure, either directly or through grants, of more than $69.4 million for the acquisition of more than 4,950 parcels totalling about 5,950 acres.