News Article

Date: June 13, 2006
By DON BEHM

Land program may go before voters

Measure proposed after Washington County Board rejects idea

The board on Tuesday voted 15-14 to rescind its decision in March to create the state's first county-wide purchase-of-development rights program.

Kine Torinus, a member of the Land Conservation Partnership, an organization representing land trusts, individuals and businesses, said the group might ask the County Board to approve placing an advisory referendum on the November ballot.

Several surveys in recent years found overwhelming public support for the county to become involved in land conservation efforts, and a referendum measure to establish purchase of development rights likely would be approved, said Sue Millin, the partnership's project coordinator.

Supervisor Roy Justman of West Bend, one of nine new supervisors seated on the board in April, said Tuesday that he would "go along" with a purchase-of-development rights program only if it is endorsed by voters in a referendum.

Other opponents of the program said that a referendum should have been held prior to the board's March vote. At Tuesday's board meeting, several board members criticized a proposal to spend at least $800,000 a year in revenue from the county's half-cent sales tax on the program. Others said the plan would benefit only a handful of farmers.

The board's vote Tuesday came just minutes after state Agriculture Secretary Rod Nilsestuen encouraged supervisors to support the program.

Nilsestuen said that he was confident a Working Lands Initiative steering committee he appointed would recommend next month that the state establish a purchase-of-development rights program. A state program could distribute funds to local efforts and help them qualify for federal grants, he said.

Washington County is losing more than 1,484 acres of farmland - 2.3 square miles - to development annually, said Supervisor Dan Stoffel, chairman of a Purchase of Development Rights Task Force that recommended a county program.

Population growth studies estimate that there will be 43% more households in the county in 2035 than there were in 2000, according to Stoffel. Preserving farmland "is a logical response to this urban pressure," he said.

The county's agricultural industry "pumps more than $629.9 million into the local economy every year," he said, citing a University of Wisconsin Extension study. "This industry supports 5,000 jobs" in the county, said Stoffel, a Town of Kewaskum farmer.

Board Chairman Tom Sackett, absent from Tuesday's meeting because of a family health emergency, had asked the board to reconsider the March vote because nine new supervisors were elected in April. Justman and four of the other new members voted with the majority Tuesday to rescind the board's earlier action.

In a purchase-of-development rights program, the county would pay willing landowners the difference between the price that a developer might pay for the property and its estimated value if sold as agricultural land. In exchange, the farmer would agree not to develop the land, even though he would remain the owner and pay taxes.

The March resolution creating the program recommended spending at least $800,000 a year on buying development rights to farmland. That's about $18 per county family, said Supervisor Donald Berchem of the Town of West Bend.

"You can't even have a pizza party for a family anymore for $18," Berchem said.