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FAUI am Page 6 farmland preservation report January 2002 VIEWPOINT Federal dollars will help, but true "tipping point" is local BY TOM DANIELS Contributing Editor At the American Farmland Trust's national conference in Illinois two months ago, several speakers spoke hopefully that farmland pres- ervation would soon reach a "tipping point," a time at which the mo- mentum for farmland preservation would make its spread across the nation irresistible. The 2002 Farm Bill, still under consideration in the Senate, looks ready to provide substantial long -term funding — proposals run from $50 million to $850 million a year— for farmland preservation grants to state and local governments and land trusts. This should be enough federal matching money to convince more state and local governments to create or expand farmland preservation programs. Future federal funding is likely to be spread far and wide, as it was in 2001. State and local governments that expect to rely upon federal money for nearly half of their funding will be disappointed. But federal funds are key to spurring and sustaining additional local programs, which in turn, can generate the tipping point. That's important. But the tipping point at the national level — mean- ing number of programs - won't occur unless those programs are suc- cessful in generating a tipping point of their own — meaning quality of programs and local agriculture. The tipping point at the county level seems to happen when farmers preserve around 20,000 acres. This much preserved acreage sends a message to the farm community, the developers, the politicians, and the public. The farmers gain a sense that they won't be pushed out. De- velopers recognize that large areas of preserved farmland (ideally to- gether with strong ag zoning) mean that they should look elsewhere to build. The politicians can point to the success of the local preservation effort. And the public gets to see a substantial amount of permanently protected open space. Some urban - influenced counties and towns, however, will never be part of the tipping point because they do not have enough farmland or farmers left; nor do they have the land use controls in place to limit sprawl into the farming areas. The public may want to keep the farm - land, and the politicians may be willing to provide substantial dollars, but a large number of the farmers can't be enticed to preserve their land because they don't see a future in farming. Farmland preservation programs continue to be enacted in urban - influenced counties in the nation's major metropolitan regions. But consider this: there are only a few dozen of these counties where a (Continued on page 7) news briefs In Virginia ...When the chair- woman of the Accomack County Board of Supervisors called the American Farmland Trust's cost of community service studies "not credible," it set off a public debate about the cost of development and the value of farmland preservation. The AFT had requested the county's support in conducting the study. Accomack County is on the state's Delmarva Peninsula. Both Frederick and Culpeper Counties have agreed to assist in AFT cost studies. Despite budget problems, a bond proposal for open space preservation is on the agenda, with $30 million targeted for the state's Agricultural Vitality Program, es- tablished last year. Tayloe Murphy, an attorney well- versed in land preservation, has been appointed Natural Re- sources Secretary. "He's been following what we've been doing and he's pretty receptive to our ideas," said Mary Heinricht of the AFT Mid - Atlantic Field Office. in Pennsylvania ... Mary Bender is the new Farmland Protection Bureau Director. Bender has been the Department of Agriculture's Policy Director since 1995. "She knows the program quite well and will do a great job," said former director Ray Pickering, now with the Piedmont Environmental Coun- cil in Virginia. Agriculture Secretary Sam Hayes announced that a record - breaking number of farms — 309 farms totaling 34,225 acres in 46 counties -- were protected in 2001. That breaks last year's record of 283 preserved farms. The new state program total is 1,785 farms totaling 215,243 acres. In Maryland... Five bills will be submitted to the legislature that are products of the MALPF Task Force; first, to reconstitute the task force so It can continue work it left unfinished, including studying statewide acreage goals, funding, installment purchases, and desig- nation of priority preservation ar- eas; a second bill would enable new guidelines on commercial