To ensure that protected land cannot be developed, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation has asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to overturn a lower court decision allowing the Ephrata Area School District to build a road on farmland preserved with a conservation easement. The CBF brief supports Lancaster County’s appeal of the decision.

“If left standing, the lower court decision would set a dangerous precedent and could roll back farmland and open space preservation across the state,” CBF’s Pennsylvania attorney Matt Royer said.

The school district wants to build a road across the protected farmland to access a proposed new school building. As holder of the conservation easement, the county objected to construction of the road.

The issue has been in the courts since 2004, when the school district argued that it does not need to obtain approval from the county prior to acquiring the property and building the road. The Lancaster County Court of Common Pleas ruled in favor of the county, holding that prior approval is required by law, but that ruling was later reversed by the Commonwealth Court. In May 2006, the county appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.

“Conservation easements are important tools to preserve farmland,” Royer said. “The county, as holder of the easement, cannot be left without a say in whether construction may occur on preserved farmland. The law clearly gives easement holders that say, and to rule otherwise would declare open season on preserved farms and open space throughout Pennsylvania.”

CBF has a longstanding partnership with farmers and farm organizations throughout the Commonwealth, and works with farmers to ensure healthy, profitable farms. CBF supports farmland preservation programs as critical to vitality of the agricultural economy, as well as to the protection of water quality in local streams, rivers, and ultimately the Chesapeake Bay.

9/1/2006