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ASHEVILLE – Buncombe County is very close to the more than 84,000-acre conservation goal it first proposed at the May 3 Board of Commissioners briefing.
According to Commissioner Terri Wells, 18%, or 76,637 acres, are protected.
Wells told the board Buncombe should set a goal of conserving 20% by 2030, or a total 84,096 acres. Buncombe’s conservation efforts are governed by the Land Conservation Advisory Board and the Agriculture Advistory Board — part of the Buncombe County Soil and Water Conservation District — which has a stated goal of preserving the area’s beauty, ecology and farmland. A total 6,036 are needed to achieve this goal.
Janet Peterson is one of many Buncombe residents who has contributed to ongoing conservation during the past decade. She owns and operates Cloud 9 Farm, a scenic cabin rental business on 187 acres of mountain land east of Asheville and west of Fairview.
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The Peterson family has a history of conservation. In the 1980s, they enrolled 200 acres in the county’s Farmland Preservation Program. Later, the county’s Soil and Water Conservation District worked to improve the land’s water quality, according to a detailed “stewardship” narrative on Cloud 9’s website.
Then, Cloud 9 became a conservation easement in May 2016.
Buncombe describes conservation easements as voluntary, perpetual deed restrictions placed on an owner’s property prohibiting or limiting future development on the property.
“Since the easements are voluntary, there is considerable flexibility afforded an owner in tailoring the easement to the owner’s needs,” the county’s conservation webpage states, noting these easements do not require a landowner to allow public access to their property.
“My motivation was, primarily, it’s the right thing to do,” Peterson said of the decision to make her land part of Buncombe’s growing conservation footprint. “We are building like crazy in this county and it’s an eyesore.”
Though some residents are selling their land, others have decided to preserve.
According to a March report from the Agriculture and Land Resources Department, since the beginning of 2021 the county closed seven conservation easement projects comprising 468.5 acres of working farms, forestland, scenic viewsheds, ridgetops, mountainsides and wildlife corridors.
Additionally, 16 conservation easements were initiated by March comprising 1,055 acres.
Peterson said she only has 17 acres of farmable land and that, if she sold it, there would be houses all over the mountains.
“And I don’t want that. That’s altruistic, but the other motivation was my taxes remain low and that’s a big plus because I can’t afford to live here if they were regular taxes.”
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Even before the recent uptick in Western North Carolina development and skyrocketing home prices, Peterson said developers were calling her constantly, proposing to buy the land and build housing.
People still send her letters despite the easement, she said. “They don’t know because they haven’t done their research.”
In many ways, Buncombe’s efforts to fund conservation efforts combats the development boom that threatens open space.
“It’s imperative that we’re good stewards of these natural resources that we are blessed to have here in Buncombe County,” Wells said. “I do believe our future generations will one day thank us for having the foresight to proactively conserve this land and reach these ambitious goals.”
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That goal won’t come cheap.
The county estimates it will need additional investment of $9.5 million to achieve its more than 6,000-acre target by 2030. Currently, 1,423 acres of conservation is “in progress” according to the county.
The annual budgetalready pours $750,000 into conservation, according to Wells’ presentation. Should the county commit an additional $9.5 million, the cost for conservation would be about $17 million over the next 8 years, according to Commission Chair Brownie Newman.
Wells noted the goal was to initiate conservation of 6,036 acres by 2030. The final paperwork on each property may not go through until years after that meaning that the goal itself won’t be reached until a few years after the turn of the decade.
“There are so many private landowners in the community who really love their land and want to see it protected for future generations,” Newman said.
Often people are willing to donate the market value of their land in the name of preservation, he noted.
“If we preserve 6,000 acres through these initiatives, that would mean that we’re preserving this land at a cost to county taxpayers of less than 3,000 per acre,” he said.
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Commissioners did not vote on any spending or even commit to the goal May 3, but told County Manager Avril Pinder they wanted to put it on an agenda in the near future, possibly the May 19 meeting.
In a regular meeting after the briefing, commissioners also approved the first steps toward a Nov. 8 bond referendum. The county is proposing borrowing $40 million for affordable housing development and $30 million for open space conservation.
Specifically, a memo for the referendum states the $30 million would be used for “acquisition and improvement of land or interests therein for conservation and protection of natural resources and preservation of farmland, including but not limited to, the development of greenways and trails for recreation purposes.”
Andrew Jones is Buncombe County government and health care reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at @arjonesreports on Facebook and Twitter, 828-226-6203 or [email protected]. Please help support this type of journalism with a subscription to the Citizen Times.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Buncombe eyes 20% land conservation goal by 2030, needs $9.5M for it
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