| DECEMBER 12, 2010 -- Glenn Vincent is a tobacco, corn and vegetable grower in West Suffield who, seven years ago, almost abandoned farming in Connecticut.
In 2003, with his son coming along as a dedicated vocational-agricultural student, Vincent wanted to expand his land holdings to ensure a new generation a shot at farming, but housing developers in northern Connecticut were bidding up the price of prime farming land to over $12,000 an acre, beyond the point where it paid to expand. Worried that he and his son couldn't afford to stay here, Vincent bought a farm near Mohawk, N.Y.
But thanks to grants from the state Department of Agriculture's Farmland Preservation Program — which leverages a mix of federal, state and local funds to buy the development rights to farms — about 185 acres in West Suffield that Vincent originally couldn't afford came on the market for about $6,000 an acre. The difference in cost came to more than $1 million in savings, and Vincent promptly expanded his farm here and sold the acreage he had just bought in New York state.
"Without the farmland preservation program I would be farming in New York right now," Vincent said. "The numbers just don't work here anymore without the state coming in and covering the potential development value of this land. Farming is tough enough without a big mortgage over your head, and this is preserving the future of farming in Connecticut."
A lot of Connecticut's farmers are saying the same thing these days. In an age of record, coast-to-coast state budget deficits and widespread despair about federal government dysfunction, farmland preservation has become a rare bright spot of cooperation between the state and federal governments — at a time of increasing interest in local farming.
Since 1978, when Connecticut began its Farmland Preservation Program, the state has purchased the development rights on 280 farms, which means that farmers can continue to farm the land or sell it someday, but never for development. The total amount of acreage saved for farming has been more than 36,000 acres. This represents about 28 percent of the state's ultimate goal of protecting 85,000 acres of crop fields on 130,000 acres of farmland.
Since the first purchase of development rights in 1979, the state has spent $121 million on the program, but the annual costs are relatively modest. In the last six years the administration of Gov. M. Jodi Rell has saved 75 farms and over 7,700 acres, for an average annual cost of $6 million.
The state's share of these preservation purchases is provided both by long-term bonding and funds from the Community Investment Act, which sets aside fees paid when state residents file deeds and other documents in town land records. About half of the state's expenditures to preserve farmland are reimbursed by Farms and Ranchland Protection funds administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and local towns and land trusts frequently contribute to the preservation purchases.
State Agricultural Commissioner F. Philip Prelli said that the state makes an effort to concentrate its preservation dollars in areas where farming is already healthy and protecting a connected "farm belt" will enhance the advantages of farming in a single area.
"When several farms in a single area are saved, you're bunching up the impact to protect an area where people are actually farming, will continue farming, and can combine their resources," Prelli said. "Farmers often lease land from others, they purchase a neighbor's land when someone leaves farming, they can share the same equipment to save costs. Having all the land nearby helps this process."
This principle is endorsed by Stanley Phillips, another West Suffield farmer who inherited his 75 acres but said that he would have found it difficult to stay in farming without the Farmland Preservation Program, which he used to sell his development rights in 2001.
"You hear a lot of people complain about government programs now, but this is one that works," Phillips said. "It's kept Suffield a farming community, and believe me the town wouldn't look the same today without this."
State and local officials also say that farmland preservation is critical during a period when farmers markets have swelled to about 125 locations around the state, and the pick-your-own segment of farming is rapidly growing, as consumers look for both recreational and healthy alternatives to traditional supermarket shopping.
Farming couple Becky and Allen Clark typify this trend. When they married in 1996, Becky worked as a veterinary technician and Allen worked as a night crew chief at American Airlines at Bradley Airport. But they both loved farming and first opened a greenhouse operation in Suffield, then expanded into goat farming and making cheese in East Granby. This June they were able to expand and consolidate their operation again, onto the 70-acre Bushy Hill Orchard in Granby, after a farmland preservation grant halved the cost of the $1 million farm.
The Clarks are planning to expand Bushy's Hill's retail and pick-your-own operation, eventually offering consumers a full range of "Connecticut grown" products, from their own cheeses, flowers, apples and baked goods to vegetables and preserves grown or made by other farmers.
"The point isn't simply that we couldn't have done this without the Farmland Preservation Program," said Becky Clark. "The point is that everyone wins. We get a place to farm that we love and Granby gets to keep some open space without a housing subdivision on it, and fresh produce and good food next door." |
