The organization which formed the basis for the present Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy began as a series of informal meetings arranged starting in 1974 by Joan Bozer, then the Erie County Legislator. A formal organization was established in 1979, taking the Buffalo Friends of Olmsted Parks as its identity. The informal organization then became officially incorporated as the result of an application filed on August 10, 1982 as a domestic not-for-profit charitable organization under chapter 501 (c) (3) of the Internal Revenue Service code.
The primary focus of the group, more commonly referred to as the BFOP for short, was to educate the public about the parks of Buffalo designed by the Olmsted firms and about the philosophy of Frederick Law Olmsted, to advocate for restoration of lost park features, to combat destructive and incompatible intrusions into the Olmsted parks, and to raise monies to assist in achieving these goals.
In 1982, the Olmsted-designed parks were named to the National Register of Historic Places, having been nominated by the BFOP. In July, 1985, the Buffalo Landmarks Preservation Board awarded the Olmsted parks system further local protection as a historic preservation district, following another application submitted by the BFOP. The city council followed up with its approval of the district.
In 1995, the Buffalo Friends of Olmsted Parks completed a lengthy and complicatied process to reorganize as the Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy, and contracted with the City of Buffalo and with the County of Erie – the legal owners of the Olmsted parks in Buffalo – to manage and improve those parks on behalf of those governmental entities. The board of directors of the revised organization was expanded to include governmental representatives and additional stakeholders from the larger Buffalo community.
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