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  • From: Road's End Farm <organic87 AT frontiernet.net>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] farmland/ranchland preservation
  • Date: Sat, 7 Apr 2012 09:29:58 -0400

Nature Conservancy might be interested. They will often work with landowners so that some uses, such as agricultural uses, continue to be allowed on the property.

Are there any local organizations working in your area? Here, for instance, there's Finger Lakes Land Trust. You might try googling "land trust" (or, possibly, "conservancy") along with area names in/near the location.

And you're right, definitely contact American Farmland Trust.

(I don't, by the way, know much about tax law, but I think the landowner needs to talk with a tax lawyer: I suspect the exemption only applies if she buys another home, but I also think there may be a once-in-a-lifetime exemption for selling your home; so she might either owe taxes whether or not she buys commercial property with the proceeds, or not owe taxes whether or not she does so. Hope that sentence makes sense; and, again, I might be wrong about either or both of those.)


-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 6A now I think
Fresh-market organic produce, small scale




On Apr 7, 2012, at 12:22 AM, KAKerby AT aol.com wrote:

Good evening everyone.  I had something pretty exciting sort of fall into my lap this week.  I grew up in Colorado, and my folks still own some commercial property there.  My dad was recently approached by a representative of a nearby landowner, an elderly widow.  That landowner is selling her large parcel, and wanted to know if she could buy one of Dad's commercial properties with the proceeds from the sale of her parcel, so that she wouldn't have to pay taxes on the sale of her real estate.  To make a long story short, as I asked Dad more about this transaction, it turns out this gal owns 20,000 acres of yet-undeveloped ag land, in a part of the state that has seen extreme urbanization and subdivision over the last 30 years.  In fact she may own one of the last remaining such parcels in the area.
 
As soon as I got wind of this, I asked Dad if she would be interested in talking to any of the various farmland/ranchland preservation groups.  He hasn't spoken to her directly, but he said he would present that possibility when they all meet to discuss terms.  Apparently her "financial advisor" is advising that she just sell out to a developer to turn that land into one more subdivision (with a golf course, no doubt). But such a developer has yet to come forward and make an offer.  So there's a window of opportunity here.  I'm hoping that by getting a regional/national preservation group involved, perhaps at least some of it can be set aside as working land, conservation area or possibly simply open space.
 
I already know about American Farmland Trust, and I will be contacting them to see if they might have interest in this transaction.  But if any of you know of other organizations I should talk to, particularly local, state or regional groups that I may not have heard of, please let me know.  I'm going to try to compile a list this weekend so that I can present Dad with the contact information in time for his first meeting next week.
 
I'll keep you all posted.  Fingers crossed we can keep at least some of this land open and even possibly keep it in agriculture........
Kathryn Kerby
frogchorusfarm.com
Snohomish, WA
Ruminations - essays on the farming life at frogchorusfarm.com/weblog.html
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