The Pennsylvania Agricultural Conservation Easement Purchase Program empowers county governments, in partnership with state government, to protect productive farmland from non-agricultural development. Easements have been purchased on hundreds of thousands of acres from farmers using state funds, county tax receipts, and other funds.
Within Pennsylvania’s many agricultural security areas, landowners receive special protection from condemnation as well as from ordinances that would unreasonably restrict farming operations.
Clean and Green is managed by the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture. Direct questions to the administrator at (717) 705-7796. Clean and Green, established by the Pennsylvania Farmland and Forest Land Assessment Act, provides for lower property tax assessments of qualified parcels capable of producing agricultural products and timber or providing open space for public use.
A conservation easement limits certain uses of the land in order to advance one or more conservation objectives while keeping the land in the owner’s control. It is established by mutual agreement of a landowner and a private land trust or government.
Fifty-eight Pennsylvania counties have agricultural land preservation boards that purchase agricultural conservation easements. Sixty-eight private, charitable land trusts accept donations of conservation easements or, less commonly, purchase them. These two paths to farmland preservation differ in many ways.
Converting areas covered by turf grass to meadows can be financially rewarding and relatively simple on both public and private land. It can also deliver substantial environmental and aesthetic benefits.
In accepting a conservation easement from you, the land trust takes on the responsibility of ensuring your land is forever conserved. Fulfilling this duty requires money. This is why the land trust seeks financial support from you or subsequent owners of the land.
Donors of land, cash, or other property may desire to place restrictions on a gift to ensure it is used only for specific purposes. To what extent might such restrictions limit or disallow a charitable tax deduction? What should a donor consider before making a restricted gift?
For large estates, death triggers the possibility of federal estate tax. A conservation easement on the deceased person’s land—whether granted in life, by will, or by the person’s heirs—can reduce or eliminate the tax owed.
In Pennsylvania, death triggers a state inheritance tax on the distribution of the deceased person’s assets (the “estate”) to the beneficiaries of the estate. Conservation restrictions in support of agriculture on land included in the estate can reduce the inheritance tax owed.
A family or group of neighbors may want to limit future use of a property, but that desire may not be shared as a priority by conservation organizations or government. In this case, a deed restriction may a sensible—albeit imperfect—tool that the private individuals can use on their own to achieve limited protection of the land.
Simply stated, a land trust is a charitable organization that acquires land or conservation easements, or that stewards land or easements, for conservation purposes. However, this simple definition leaves much to be explained.
In brief, WeConservePA uses the word conservation to mean the act of caring for and wisely using land to ensure that the land’s natural resources can continue to benefit people and wildlife over time, and, where the land is degraded, restoring its capacity to deliver these benefits.