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ORANGE COUNTY <br />BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS <br />ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT <br />Meeting Date: September 6, 2007 <br />Action Agenda <br />Item No. 3 - b <br />SUBJECT: Resolution of Approval - Conservation Easement for the Tate Farm <br />DEPARTMENT: Environment and Resource PUBLIC HEARING: (Y/N) No <br />Conservation <br />ATTACHMENTS <br />Resolution of Approval <br />Location Map <br />Site Map <br />Draft Conservation Easement <br />INFORMATION CONTACT: <br />David Stancil, 245-2590 <br />Rich Shaw, 245-2591 <br />PURPOSE: To consider a resolution to approve the purchase of and acceptance by Orange <br />County of an agricultural conservation easement for the Tate family farm. <br />BACKGROUND: The acquisition of agricultural conservation easements to protect prime <br />farmland in Orange County is a longstanding goal of the Board of Commissioners, and is a <br />priority of the Lands Legacy Program. Since completing the County's first agricultural <br />conservation easement in 2001, Orange County has protected 1,153 acres of prime farmland <br />and riparian buffers with conservation easements. Another 834 acres of important natural <br />and cultural resource lands have been protected by other means. <br />In April 2005, Orange County, in cooperation with the Orange NRCS/Soil and Water <br />Conservation District Office, applied for matching grant funds from the federal Farm and <br />Ranch Land Protection Program (FRPP). A portion of those grant funds will be used to <br />purchase a conservation easement to protect approximately 78 acres of the Tate Farm. <br />The Tate Farm is located at the intersection of Harmony Church Road and Lynch Store <br />Road, northwest of Hillsborough near the Orange - Alamance county line (Cedar Grove <br />Township). The farm is owned and operated by Hurley and Louise Tate, with assistance <br />from their son, Roger Tate. Roger is the 5th generation of Tates to farm this land. <br />Over the past several years, the Tates have converted their former tobacco farm to a chicken <br />farm. The Tates have three large chicken houses that hold over 40,000 birds. Portions of <br />the land are also used to grow hay and for pasturing a few beef cattle and horses. <br />The Tates enrolled their farm in a Voluntary Agricultural District (1999), and have a well- <br />established conservation plan that they implement with guidance and assistance from the <br />Orange County NRCS field office.