There are apparently a lot of local properties in these government conservation easements. When land goes into the program here, adjacent landowners are notified by mail. Land behind me, across the road from me, land adjacent to my daughter's place, land across the road from my daughter's business - all in the program as we received notification letters. So, maybe just a coincidence or more likely there is a lot of use of this program here.
I am suspicious that the main motivation for the properties I mentioned is the money received more so than conservation. Seems to me that people here use the program simply to acquire more land. Put some land into the program and receive a chunk of money. Use that money as down payment to purchase more land. Put that new land into the program and receive more money. Buy more land and repeat. Government ends up subsidizing the purchase of land. Land that the farmer might not have been able to afford without the program. May not be that way everywhere, but I see how it works here.
If you read the original post in this thread started in 2006, there was a reference to an article in the Cattle Today magazine. (CT started as a newspaper/magazine about cattle, not as an internet forum.) That article is about taxes and deductions as a result of signing up for the program. Money was the theme of that article more so than conservation.
On the topic of who enforces and administers the terms of the easement, here is my observation of what I see here. I attached in a previous post in this thread a slightly redacted copy of the agreement for a local property in the program. The owner decided to sell the property. Someone who was interested in buying toured the property and met with the local group in charge to better understand the restrictions. They were local people who had some amount of ag or rural background. Obvious from that meeting that they did not understand the program very well. They mentioned that timber could be harvested, but there were steps that would need to be completed including a timber management plan. The person interested in buying the property informed the group in charge that the property had been recently clear cut. No trees left. All sold by the owner already. My conclusion in this case is that no one is checking compliance. Just do what you want unless you get caught due to a complaint. Then pay a big price maybe.
I visited Thomas Jefferson's Monticello estate last week. Very interesting place to visit. But led me to have this thought - if these conservation easements existed in the 1700's and 1800's, I wonder what the terms might have been for future agricultural use. Times and workable practices have changed a LOT. Would they have had enough vision of future ag to write a document that would be timeless to preserve the ag use and still have an economically viable farm? I wonder if the current wording and restrictions in conservation easements will allow properties to remain in productive viable agricultural use in 200 to 300 years. Or if the terms and restrictions will so bind the use of the property that it can only be a historic display or a grown-up wilderness. Forever is a long time and the expectation of being able to craft an easement document now that will allow a farm to remain a useful ag property forever may be hard to achieve. Independent of what you do with a property, you will be forever physically bound to the neighboring properties and how they are used and developed. Remember the little old lady who would not sell her house to the New Jersey casino's and ended up living in a house surrounded by high rise casino's. Did she win or lose?
