TOPSHAM (AP) – The Maine Coast Heritage Trust is featuring an undeveloped island in Harpswell in an advertising campaign urging Mainers to support funding for a conservation program.

The trust acquired the 125-acre Whaleboat Island last year. It will be prominently featured in paid advertisements asking the Legislature to authorize between $100 million and $150 million for the Land for Maine’s Future program.

Maine Coast Heritage Trust is part of a coalition of land conservation groups forming to support funding the program.

“We want to continue to tell our story,” said Richard Knox, spokesman for the trust.

Maine voters approved a $35 million bond issue in 1987 to preserve such landmarks as Mt. Kineo on Moosehead Lake. In 1999, nearly 70 percent of Maine voters approved an additional $50 million in Land for Maine’s Future funding. Since its inception, the program has been able to protect 110 land conservation projects throughout the state.

Some of the larger efforts have included the acquisition of Tumbledown Mountain in Weld and 6,000 acres east of Augusta in the Kennebec Highlands.

But the $50 million that was authorized four years ago will soon be gone, according to Tim Glidden, director of the Land for Maine’s Future program.

“Come January of next year we won’t be able to entertain any new proposals for land conservation,” Glidden said.

Lee Umphrey, spokesman for Gov. John Baldacci, said the governor supports a $100 million land conservation bond issue. Rep. John Richardson (D-Brunswick) will introduce legislation during the next session that calls for a $150 million bond issue.

The trust, the Maine chapter of the Nature Conservancy, the Maine Audubon Society, the League of Conservation Voters, the Natural Resources Council of Maine and the Trust for Public Land are prepared to join forces to promote another round of funding.

AP-ES-11-28-03 0721EST