Bill would permit farmers to build on preserved land

Linda Neal, a Taneytown horsebreeder and hay farmer known as “The Hay Lady” — as painted on the side of her truck — paid hundreds of dollars in preparation for building a second house to accommodate hired help before Carroll County told her she couldn’t build another residence.

A 2001 ordinance banning people from endlessly subdividing their land to sell homes for profit neglected to include a clause for farmers who joined Carroll’s agricultural preservation program after selling their development rights but want to build secondary dwellings for farmhands or family.

“It was an unintended consequence when we cleaned up county codes” during a review with residents six years ago, county attorney Kim Millender said.

Now, county officials want to fix the oversight so the hundreds of farmers in the preservation program have the option of building a detached dwelling instead of forcing Aunt Millie to live in a trailer.

While only a handful have requested to build tenant houses on their farms, the county is halfway through its goal of preserving 100,000 acres of agricultural land as open space, said Ralph Robertson, the program’s administrator.

Neal, who breeds Rocky Mountain horses, said she wants to hire a worker to live on the farm to supervise “foaling” — horsespeak for labor, which usually occurs at night.

“I’m tired of staying up,” said Neal, whose father-in-law was the first Carroll farmer to put his land under easement in 1989.

Also this week, Carroll commissioners voted to eliminate a 15-year-old incentive program in which the county supplements the state’s payment to farmers for development rights to entice landowners to place their farms under easement in the agricultural preservation program.

With land prices soaring to $6,000 an acre and climbing, Robertson said, Carroll no longer needs the program and will phase it out over three years.

kvolkmann@baltimoreexaminer.com