News Article

Date: May 23, 2006
By DAVE RANK - Daily News Staff

PDR land proponents offer their 10 reasons

Dan Stoffel already had his 10 reasons why a purchase of development rights program would be good for Washington County when he arrived Monday night, and the rest of the the County Board’s PDR Workgroup 1 quickly agreed with him.

After all, they heard it all before.

Monday, the five county supervisors assigned by County Board Chairman Thomas Sackett to define the benefits to the county in a proposed countywide PDR program hardly needed an hour to make their case.

Stoffel, a County Board supervisor from the town of Kewaskum, was chairman of the county’s Purchase of Development Rights Task Force that in February presented a 28-page report proposing such a rural land preservation program be created by the County Board.

On the pro-PDR work group with Stoffel are County Board supervisors Mark Krum-biegel, town of Jackson; Herb Tennies, West Bend; Donald Berchem, town of West Bend, monitor; and Ralph Hensel, West Bend, alternate member.

Stoffel also led the PDR presentation to the full County Board in March, right before the board voted 17-11 to authorize creation of such a program for 2007. All five PDR Work Group 1 members voted for the program March 14.

The March 14 resolution asked for an ordinance creating the program and that the county fund it with $800,000 annually from its sales tax revenue.

But two weeks ago, Sackett, the newly elected board chairman, created a pair of work groups to argue both sides of the issue, saying he wanted the new board, which has nine new members following the April 4 election, to restate its stand on creating the first county-funded PDR program in the state before proceeding with developing one and officially allowing funding for it.

Last week the five-member anti-PDR team (Workgroup 2) compiled its 10 reasons not to pursue such a program, with most of their arguments centering around high costs, a perceived lack of benefit for all taxpayers and the potential to hinder economic development.

Monday, the pro-PDR team saw things quite differently.

"PDR is a vital tool for implementing local land use plans and a community vision," was the first point, in Stoffel’s list of reasons "why Washington County needs PDR."

"A PDR program attracts agricultural investment and creates jobs" was point No. 2.

The county has a $629.9 million agricultural industry, Stoffel pointed out, "supporting 5,000 jobs ... and contributing $202.3 million to the county’s total income and paying $20.7 million in local and state taxes."

Losing agriculture will reduce the economic diversity of the area, Stoffel pointed out. We do have productive farmland here," Stoffel said. "We’re not trying to preserve something that isn’t working."

And a PDR program would benefit the entire county, not just a few farmers, said Mary Krumbiegel, a County Board supervisor from the town of Jackson. She also was a member of the PDR Task Force formed in November last year.

Agriculture creates the rural atmosphere people always say they want to see maintained in the county, she said. It also contributes open spaces, environmental protection, hunting and recreational benefits.

"It increases the quality of life in the county," Krumbiegel said.

Both work groups will present their position papers to the County Board’s Planning, Con-servation and Parks Committee June 7, which is then supposed to make a recommendation supporting or opposing implementing the rural land conservation project to the full board to debate June 13.

Berchem also said he would ask Sackett to include on the June 13 agenda a second presentation on the PDR Task Force’s report so that all of the board members would have a chance to hear it.

He will also ask that a report be given to the full board on a fact-finding mission three county representatives took April 5-10 as part of a statewide group investigating successful long-running PDR programs in Maryland, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Krumbiegel, Herb Wolf, assistant administrator for the Planning and Parks Department, and Sue Millin, coordinator for the private Land Conservation Partnership, were among the 50 Wisconsin representatives from 11 counties who went on that trip. Millin paid her own way; Krumbiegel and Wolf were funded by the county and donations from 49 private businesses.

On the anti-PDR work group were Mark McCune, town of Erin; Charlene Brady, Germantown; and Joan Russell, Hartford; with Lawrence Hoffman, West Bend, as the alternate and David Rader-macher, town of Richfield as the work group monitor. They voted against the program March 14.