by Larry Chowning –
Of Middlesex County’s 83,391 acres, 4,085 acres (4.9%) are in protected conservation easements.
Conservation easements are designed to protect the rural atmosphere of a community or county for future generations. One of the main goals stated in Middlesex County’s comprehensive plan is to maintain the rural integrity of the county.
A tool that can be used by the private sector to direct government into following the will of the comprehensive plan is to put large tracts of land into conservation easements.
In 2006, Johnny and E.G. Fleet put their 404-acre Fairfield Farm at Hartfield into a conservation easement. The brothers wanted to maintain the rural integrity of the farm and the sentimental values that they have for the homeplace where they grew up.
“I don’t think we should forget that the county has generationally prospered because of farming, oystering and forestry,” said E.G. “We wanted our home and land to stay in agriculture and this was one way that we were able to do it.”
Johnny said three generations of the Fleet family sat down in a meeting and asked the question: “Do we ever want to sell our family farm?” When the answer came back “no” they decided as a family to put it in a conservation easement.
Middlesex government officials have at times been on the fence concerning the impact conservation easements have on the tax base. However, land in easements are beneficial to the county in that it lowers the overall value of the land and brings down the county’s composite index, which increases state and federal funding to county schools and other agencies.
