Agland Preservation

Sat 30 Oct 2010

Agland Preservation

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The history of U.S Farmland Preservation began when the state of New Jersey passed the Farmland Assessment Act of 1964 to mitigate the loss of farmland to rapid suburban development through the use of favorable tax assessments. But by the late 1970s, the value of farmland had outstripped the tax benefits of the act, so the state purchased deed restrictions on farms through the Agriculture Retention and Development Act of 1981.

Regional efforts in Monmouth County, New Jersey include the Navesink Highlands Greenway, a project of the Monmouth County Farmland Preservation Program, which, along with the Monmouth Conservation Foundation, purchased the development rights of the Holly Crest Farm in Middletown in September 2008 for US $2.5 million. Over 20 percent of county farmlands and open spaces are permanently preserved.

American Farmland Trust was established in 1980 to preserve farmland and promote sustainable farming practices.

The Genesee Valley Conservancy was founded in New York in 1990.

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Fri 10 Dec 2010

Farmland Preservation – Delaware

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The Delaware Department of Agriculture’s Planning Section is a technical and professional enterprise within the Department which includes land use planning, agricultural lands preservation and computer operations.

The Planning Section exists to:

Secure the future livability of Delaware and its agricultural heritage though sound planning, advocacy, land preservation, education and information;
And, to always strive for improved service to our clients. Our services will be delivered in an impartial, ethical, timely, reliable and consistent manner.

The Delaware Agricultural Lands Preservation Program was formed with the adoption of House Bill 200 in July, 1991. It is the only official program that protects land for agricultural purposes. There are no such programs at the local level. Also, there are very few land use controls at the state or local levels that effectively preserve, or attempt to preserve agricultural land – they attempt to “steer” or slow growth at best.

Participation in the program is voluntary and has two components. First, landowners join the program by creating an Agricultural Preservation District. An Agricultural Preservation District contains at least 200 contiguous acres that are devoted to agricultural and related uses. Any lands less than 200 usable (and contiguous) acres within three miles of an established district can be enrolled into the program as a District Expansion.

Landowners who place their lands into Agricultural Preservation Districts agree to not develop their lands for at least 10 years, devoting the land only to agriculture and related uses. In return, the owners receive tax benefits, right-to-farm protection, and an opportunity to sell a Preservation Easement to the state that keeps the land free from Development Permanently.

There are now 129,163 acres in 519 Agricultural Preservation Districts and District expansions in Delaware. Out of the 129,163 acres currently in Agricultural Preservation Districts, 307 properties encompassing approximately 64,830 acres have been permanently protected through the Purchase of Preservation Easements for $67.4 Million (see charts for breakdown by county).

High quality soils, significant agricultural infrastructure, historical and environmental significance are all factors that have been considered in the selection of farms for permanent preservation. Many of these farms are contiguous to already protected land and complement the State’s open space preservation efforts by creating natural buffers between development and public open space. Thus far, the program has been successful in striking a balance between two important goals:

Preserving a critical mass of crop land, forest land, and open space to sustain Delaware’s number one industry and quality of life, and
Providing landowners an opportunity to preserve their land in the face of increasing development pressures and decreasing commodity values.

With landowners volunteering to sell Preservation Easements at an average of 51 percent below appraised value, the Foundation estimates that $50 Million may purchase easements on all of the farms of landowners currently seeking permanent preservation of their land. This is unheard of anywhere in the nation for a program of this nature. Yet, Delaware is in a position to accomplish this amazing feat! Continued funding of the Program increases the desire for landowners to place their land into Agricultural Preservation Districts in favor of rezoning or subdividing for non-agricultural purposes. This activity, combined with the current permanent preservation of Delaware’s farms at a modest cost of $1,039 per acre, is a true bargain for the State’s taxpayers of today and a wise investment for the generations to come.

Delaware Agricultural Lands Preservation Foundation: Current News

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Sun 31 Oct 2010

State and Local Farmland Preservation Programs

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The foundation for Farmland Preservation lies in state and local level activities and involvement across the country.

Many successful state and local policy initiatives focus on farmland protection and local food systems. States such as New Mexico, Texas, Georgia, Virginia and Hawaii recently created new farmland protection programs, while others such as Connecticut signed new funding for a program into law. There are 28 state-level, and more than 60 local-level, farmland protection initiatives and programs in place around the country including Delaware’s State-level Farmland Protection Program, which is today one the most successful of its kind in the nation.

Below are examples of State Farmland Preservation Programs:

Delaware

North Carolina

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Sat 30 Oct 2010

Forestland Preservation

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In 1963, a constitutional amendment was passed by the NJ Legislature, allowing a property tax valuation based on agricultural or horticultural use. The following year, the Farmland Assessment Act was passed. Widely publicized as an effective and low-cost solution to conserving open space in New Jersey, the Farmland Assessment Act blended the desperate need for property tax equity by farmers with the conservation and scenic concerns of the urban population.

As property taxes increased in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, sometimes dramatically, many forest land owners began to apply for Farmland Assessment. This trend was first reported by the Division of Taxation in 1976, when 47,825 acres of non-appurtenant woodlands were recorded, compared to 297,687 acres of total woodlands. Landowners used the justification that trees were “plants… useful to man.” Many within the NJ Forest Service and the forestry and conservation community were concerned that the Farmland Assessment Act, as it then existed, could favor excessive and unnecessary cutting of trees, and would undermine foresters’ authority to justify judicious and necessary harvests.

Therefore, in 1986, the Farmland Assessment Act was modified to standardize forest planning and establish criteria for practicing foresters. At this point language was inserted so that excessive and unnecessary cutting would disqualify a property from receiving Farmland Assessment.

The Highlands region was one area of the state that saw early enrollment (pre-1986) into the Farmland Assessment program by lands that were primarily forested. This was especially true in municipalities with very high values for unimproved land, such as northern Somerset County, northern Hunterdon County, and Morris County. In 1989, there were 384,737 acres of woodland in the Farmland Assessment program, of which 137,764 acres were considered non-appurtenant (Div. Tax., 1998). In 2004, the 88 municipalities in the Highlands region contained 100,616 acres of woodlands enrolled in the Farmland Assessment program. Of that total, about 75% were under an active woodland management plan, also known as a forest management plan.

In 2010, the NJ Forest Stewardship Act was signed into law. This law modifies the way that forestland can qualify for Farmland Assessment if a qualifying Forest Stewardship Plan is developed and is being followed on a property. This law is not currently in effect, and the implementing regulations have not yet been written.

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Sat 30 Oct 2010

How Farmland is Preserved

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In the United States, a conservation easement (or Conservation covenant) is an encumbrance — sometimes including a transfer of usage rights (easement) — which creates a legally enforceable land preservation agreement between a landowner and a government agency (municipality, county, state, federal) or a qualified land protection organization (often called a “land trust“), for the purposes of conservation. It restricts real estate development, commercial and industrial uses, and certain other activities on a property to a mutually agreed upon level. The property remains the private property of the landowner.

The decision to place a conservation easement on a property is strictly a voluntary one where the easement is sold or donated. The restrictions of the easement, once set in place, “run with the land” and are binding on all future owners of the property (in other words, the restrictions are perpetual). The restrictions are spelled out in a legal document that is recorded in the local land records and the easement becomes a part of the chain of title for the property. Appraisals of the value of the easement, and financial arrangements between the parties (land owner and land trust), generally are kept private.

The primary purpose of a conservation easement is to protect land from certain forms of development or use. Lands for which conservation easements may be desirable include agricultural land, timber resources, and/or other valuable natural resources such as wildlife habitat, clean water, clean air, or scenic open space. Protection is achieved primarily by separating the right to subdivide and build on the land from the other rights of ownership. The landowner who gives up these “development rights” continues to privately own and manage the land and may receive significant state and federal tax advantages for having donated and/or sold the conservation easement. Perhaps more importantly, the landowner has contributed to the public good by preserving the conservation values associated with their land for future generations. In accepting the conservation easement, the easement holder has a responsibility to monitor future uses of the land to ensure compliance with the terms of the easement and to enforce the terms if a violation occurs.

Although a conservation easement prohibits certain uses by the landowner, such an easement does not make the land public. On the contrary, many conservation easements confer no use of the land either to the easement holder or to the public. Furthermore, many conservation easements reserve to the landowner specific uses which if not reserved would be prohibited. Some conservation easements confer specific uses to the easement holder or to the public. These details are spelled out in the legal document that creates the conservation easement.

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Agland Preservation