Agenda 09-03-19 Item 8-a - Minutes

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12 1 The Board considered applications from six (6) landowners/farms to certify qualifying 2 farmland within the Caldwell, Cedar Grove, High Rock/Efland, and Cane Creek/Buckhorn 3 Voluntary Agricultural Districts; and vote to enroll the lands in the Orange County Farmland 4 Preservation Voluntary and Enhanced Voluntary Agricultural District programs. 5 Gail Hughes, Soil Conservationist, and Commissioner McKee will recuse themselves 6 when talking about the McKee Farm. 7 8 BACKGROUND: Orange County's Voluntary Farmland Preservation Program started in 1992. 9 There are 109 farms in both the Voluntary Agricultural District (VAD) and the Enhanced 10 Voluntary Agricultural District (EVAD) program totaling 14,303* acres as of December 2018. 11 12 The County's Voluntary Farmland Protection Ordinance (VFPO) outlines a procedure for the 13 Agricultural Preservation Board to review and approve applications for qualifying farmland, and 14 to make recommendations to the Board of Commissioners concerning the establishment and 15 modification of agricultural districts. Section VII of the VFPO contains the requirements for 16 inclusion in a voluntary agricultural district. To be certified as qualifying farmland, a farm must: 17 a) Be located in the unincorporated area of Orange County; 18 b) Be engaged in Agriculture as that word is defined in NC GS 106-581.1 19 c) Be certified by the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) of the United 20 States Department of Agriculture as being a farm on which at least two-thirds of the 21 land is composed of soils that are best suited for providing food, seed, fiber, forage, 22 timber, forestry products, horticultural crops and oil seed crops; 23 d) Be managed in accordance with the Natural Resources Conservation Service and 24 NC Soil and Water Conservation Service defined erosion-control practices that are 25 addressed to said highly-erodible land; and have a current conservation farm plan 26 and/or forestry management plan associated with the current usages and owner; 27 e) Be the subject of a non-binding conservation agreement, as defined in N.C.G.S. 28 §121-35, between the County and the owner that prohibits non-farm use or 29 development of such land for a period of at least ten years, except for the creation of 30 not more than three lots that meet applicable County zoning and subdivision 31 regulations. 32 33 The Orange County Agricultural Preservation Board reviewed the findings of the staff 34 assessments for the attached applications for the Orange County Voluntary Agricultural District 35 program at the March and May 2019 meetings. All farm applications were reviewed and verified 36 to have met or exceeded the minimum criteria for certification into the program. 37 38 The Agricultural Preservation Board voted unanimously to recommend approval of the 39 certification for six (6) farms and their inclusion in the Voluntary and/or the Enhanced Voluntary 40 Agricultural District program. The certification documentation is on file in the DEAPR/Soil and 41 Water Conservation District office. The farms are described briefly below: 42 43 Brief Farm Descriptions: 44 1) Owners, Lynn and Teresa Holloway, and Alene Holloway, have submitted an application 45 to enroll three (3) parcels of land totaling 122.05 acres as qualifying farmland for the 46 Voluntary Agricultural District program (VAD) in the Cedar Grove Agricultural District. 47 The farm operation includes tobacco, small grains, and managed woodland. The farm 48 has been evaluated against each of the VAD certification requirement standards and 49 meets or exceeds all of the measures above. 50 2) Owners, Howard and Karen McAdams (McAdams Farm), have submitted an application 51 to enroll one (1) of parcel of land totaling 22.68 acres as qualifying farmland for the