As a farmer who has witnessed some of Wisconsin’s best farmland be gobbled up by urban sprawl and other uses for years, I must say I was surprised to learn about a new group that claims to represent myself and other farmers.
The Wisconsin Homeowners Alliance has been sending strange mailings to rural folks and running full-page advertisements in newspapers claiming to represent my interests. Let me be clear: The group does not represent me nor does it represent other farmers that I know.
It represents realtors. It bills itself as a nonpartisan, nonprofit advocacy group. In fact, the group was formed by the Wisconsin Realtors Association, and its board of directors is comprised completely of realtors. The Wisconsin Homeowners Alliance is not looking out for farmers who are trying to build a strong agricultural economy in Wisconsin. It is looking out for the folks who want to buy farm land on the cheap and take it out of production.
This organization opposes the conversion fee for land that is rezoned out of exclusive ag zoning under the state’s new Working Lands Initiative law. This legislation was passed in 2009 with strong support across the state. I was among those who supported it.
After years of public discussion and general agreement about the importance of the Working Lands Initiative, this organization that supposedly represents my interests is using last-minute scare tactics and misrepresentations in an effort to get the state Legislature to rescind or delay the conversion fee.
A conversion fee has always been part of the state’s Farmland Preservation Program. Under the new law, the fee will be easier to collect and will be used to help fund efforts to protect our working lands, which support Wisconsin’s most important industry.
Under the new law, farmers will be able to build a home or two for our children. We’ll also be able to sell the land to other farmers. In some cases, conditional use permits will allow us to build other homes on our farmland, too. I’m really hoping that the law will prevent what I have seen too much of in my lifetime – crops of houses and pavement that forever eat up some of our best farmland and make it harder for farmers to keep farming.
If the law is going to work, we need the conversion fee to assure farmland protection and encourage wise development in places where it belongs. When it comes to working lands protection, you can believe farmers like me or the realtors who run the Wisconsin Homeowners Alliance. The choice is up to you.
Bob Uphoff
