The Ohio Department of Agriculture (ODA)-Farmland Preservation Office has announced that sign-up for the Local Agricultural Easement Purchase Program (LAEPP) will begin on January 18, 2022. Applications must be submitted to ODA by April 18, 2022. LAEPP is a program that is funded through Clean Ohio and administered by ODA through Local Sponsors. Seneca Conservation District (SCD) is the Local Sponsor for Seneca County.
The Agricultural Easement program allows landowners to sell an agricultural easement to ODA for their farm property. In this program, an agricultural easement is a contract between a landowner and ODA where the property associated with the easement will, for all time, be used exclusively for agricultural purposes and cannot be used for any commercial purposes or subdivided.
ODA pays the landowner a maximum of $2,000 per acre for these easements; however, interested persons should be aware of the stipulations associated with an ag easement before applying. Some of the basic requirements are that the property must be a minimum of 40 acres in size, in CAUV, and enrolled in the Agricultural District with the Seneca County Auditor’s Office.
SCD coordinates the application process which begins with providing the interested landowner with all of the necessary information so that landowner can share this information with family and legal and financial advisors so the landowner can make an informed decision. It is imperative that a landowner know about all of the requirements associated with an ag easement, prior to selling one on their property.
SCD prepares and submits the application on the behalf of the landowner and ODA assigns a points-based score of each farm. The highest scoring farm will be accepted into the program and, if additional funds are available, additional applicant farms may be selected. For the 2022 LAEPP funding year, ODA has allocated $181,254 to Seneca County to purchase agricultural easement(s). If you are interested in selling an ag easement on your farm ground, feel free to contact Rick Hassinger at (419) 447-7073.
