Orange County NC Website
Agricultural District Ordinance Notes 09/10/03 <br />Article XI, Section A (1) <br />This provision allows for the only legally effective way to ensure that someone searching the chain <br />of title of a tract of land will find that the land is within the proximity of an agricultural district. <br />The way this provision is written for this model assumes that a county adopting this ordinance has <br />not computerized their land records system yet. However, if a county's land records system is <br />already computerized, this part of section A should be changed to reflect that. <br />Article XI, Section C <br />This provision is not required by the Farmland Preservation Enabling Act, however, it is a part of a <br />well- designed public education program. <br />Article XI1I, General Notes <br />The statute gives county commissioners authority to extend the waiver of sewer and water <br />assessments to farms inside or outside of agricultural districts. The county may not want to grant <br />this waiver to farms outside of agricultural districts, however. The waiver could be a valuable <br />incentive to offer to farms to encourage them to create or join an agricultural district; farms that <br />otherwise might not become involved in a county agricultural district program might do so to <br />receive the waiver. Restricting waivers to land within agricultural districts also reduces the cost of <br />the program to the county. <br />Some federal, state, or other sewer and/or water construction or improvement grants may have <br />provisions in conflict with this waiver provision. The county may want to include a provision, such <br />as the one in (F) that avoids such conflicts. <br />Article XIV, Section B <br />This provision for the posting of a notice in the office of the Register of Deeds is useful for <br />educational purposes, however, it does not provide record notice of the agricultural district to <br />purchasers of property. Only the "Record Notice of Proximity to Voluntary Agricultural District" <br />provision of Article XI, Notification, can provide record notice to a potential purchaser that the tract <br />of land in question is located within one -half aerial mile of a voluntary agricultural district. This <br />provision is included in the model ordinance primarily as a means to educate the public that <br />agricultural districts exist in a county. <br />