Dedicated open space

[Bill Haack]

At the meeting Brian Standing showed a map of Wet lands, that also included Dedcated open space. On my farm this open space is south of Liberty St.,in pasture well out of the wet lands part of the map. If this map is approved by the Town, will that eliminate the possibility of my daughter building in that pasture. Have already had a sight visit. How will this map dictate the use of other property in Primrose?
Bill

[Bill Haack]

Was hoping to get some feedback on dedicated open space from others and Brian Standing before the next meeting. Bill

[Gib Docken]

Bill
You better get something in writing ASAP or you'll end up like everyone else wanting to build in a specific place!
Gib

[Cindi Haack]

I would like to see Primrose stay rural and agricultural, but we need to all get involved in the new Land Use and Comprehensive Plan decisions. Every Property Owner in the township of Primrose needs to look at this closely. On the surface, the plan looks reasonable, but once you take a closer look, you will understand how this will encroach on your Constitutional Rights as a land owner.
If you own property that could be used for, or fits in the following categories you will be affected by the new Comprehensive plan. Government entities want control of all of these areas. They include but are not limited to the following:
Travel Corridors, Environmental Corridors, Open-Space Corridors, Recreational Areas both in and out of the Open Space or any of the other items listed, View Sheds, View Scapes, Wooded Property, Grasslands, Land on Slopes, Wildlife Corridors. Property that has Scenic Qualities, Scenic Driving Corridors, Historical Sites, Wet Lands, Hydraulic Soils, Hydraulic Plants, Recreational Trails, Bike Trails, Hiking Trails, Park Trails and Possible Park Trails. Any property that will link DNR land to Parkland and/or all Trails together, also property that has a Conservancy use. All Watershed areas, Expanded Floodplains, Public Right of Ways, Public Easement, Wildlife Habitat, Erodible Soil, Savannas and Property with Mineral Rights. Any property having Natural Resources, or Property that is used for Ground Water Recharging, Flood Control, Ecosystems, and all Adjacent Landscapes. All Streams, lake beds, Ponds, Open Water Bodies, any Property that will Protect all Landscapes, Prairies, Natural Areas, Trails for Canoes, Kayaks, Watercraft and Property that can be used to Access Waterways. It also includes any Property that is Adjacent to a State, County, or Local Park. Archaeological sites, Wildlife or Conservation Area, and Open-Space Networks. All Property That can be used for Natural Resource Protection or Conservation Utility Corridors, Stream Corridors, Shoreland and Stream Banks. Any Property that has Natural Scenic Beauty, Urban Lakes, or stream Bank buffers. Included is Property that can be used to Manage Storm water Run-off and All Property used for Natural Infiltration and Headwater Areas, Vegetative Buffers, Slope Protection and Conservancy Overlay Districts. Any Property that will Protect Wellheads, Ag land, Property with Good Soils, Urban Service Areas, Environmentally Sensitive Land, Large Tracts of Ag Land, Property with Poor Soil, and Property with Other Resource Features, Sledge Meadows, Wet Meadows, Inland Fresh Meadows, Deep and Shallow Marshes, Swamps, . This will also affect anyone who has Riparian Water Rights. (The previous items are direct quotes from governmental documents and Maps issued by Dane County Planning and Zoning.)

As you can see, this includes just about everybody. As if this isn't enough, by acquiring these corridors, and gaining control of other properties, they are going to use this as a basis to grab or control more property later. I have been digging in these documents, both on the Internet and information from other places for close to four years now. They are using Overlay Maps to encroach upon private property. Do not make the mistake of looking at just one document or one map, it is cumulative, map, after map, after map.
We agree that the “protection of natural areas including the wet lands, wildlife habitat, lakes, woodlands, open-space and ground water resources” is a good idea but not at the expense of the land owners Constitutional Rights. The problem comes when you look at the details. Every single phrase or a paragraph, which talks about preserving and protecting our groundwater, immediately includes “for recreational activities or View Scapes.” So, it appears to me that the comprehensive plan, as the county has written it, only wants the control of more property. Dane County planning and zoning actually has training manuals that explain how the comprehensive plan will be used as a “police power” to control the land owners use of their property. In addition to the 1981 adoption of Farmland Preservation, we have gone from 1 house per acre to 1 house per 35 acres, dedicating 30 + acres to Farmland. In other townships where this policy has already been implemented, property values have been driven down and no buyer in their right mind, wants anything to do with it.
Since my husband and I purchased the property in 1981, we have been involved in multiple preservation activities. We have a DNR easement that runs along the creek on our property for public fishing. We have sold 61 acres to what is now called Donald Park. We have also added property to the Forest and Fame Park in the village of Mt. Vernon. My husband Bill was involved in the very first group of farmers who started sustainable agriculture and no till Programs. When we’ve harvested trees we don’t clear cut, we always hire a Forrester to select trees to cut, and we have replanted 100’s of trees here. We have worked with DNR officials, Raptor Ridge, and Veterinarians to rehab and save wildlife. Our farm also serves as a release point for owls and other wildlife. The Sugar River Horse’n Around Club was started in our kitchen. We were then able to communicate to Dane County, and Dane County Parks that people were interested in an equestrian trail through Donald Park. In the planning stages, I spent many hours on the phone with the architectural company, who were drawing up plans for Donald Park. Bill went around to local land owners to get private easements to make the trail longer and helped to create it. We received an award from Ducks Unlimited, and were recognized by Dane County Board for our contribution to Donald Park. Our property is unique because we have fostered and protected wildlife and worked to preserve the land, so we are the home of many animals and several Breeding Sand hill Cranes, kestrels, a breeding pair of Wood Ducks, Canadian geese, Great Blue Herons that return here every year. Even though we have voluntarily done all this work, and contributed to the parks, and to public fishing, to the preservation of the environment, and to the preservation of wildlife, we find out at a meeting that there is a big chunk of our property in “Dedicated Open Space” that the county is basically taking from us, without due process, and forbidding us to build on it. Apparently no good deed goes unpunished. That property meets every other requirement of the Farmland Preservation criteria within Primrose. This is right along our driveway, on the poorest Ag land we own. This is also along the equestrian trail that we worked so hard at to get established.
The County will tell you that you can have this status changed by asking for a variance or having an inspection by the Zoning Administrator. We have been that very route and it took us 2 years and the help of our County Rep to get the Zoning Administrator here and to have an inspection of the Flood Plain Setback and its navigable water ways and now Dane County Planning and Zoning have told us that the inspection and the decision and the documents do not mean anything. I had asked The Zoning Administrator about correcting the FEMA maps to reflect his decision, and I was told by the Zoning Administrator that FEMA and the Government were responsible for changing the maps. Now, we are told that we are supposed to pay a fee for an application to change the maps. I have been to the FEMA website, and there are people on there who have submitted applications that have been waiting for years for a decision about changing the maps. Currently, we have been waiting for an additional two years, for a Parcel Status Determination that we never received. We had to submit an application along with $100 for a decision that was never given. In the new Comprehensive Plan, the county wants to set aside funds and collect fees to employ more people to do site inspections. We don’t understand this, because we've already been told that the decisions and documents that the Zoning Administrator issues are worthless. They can't have it both ways. We would like to know what the exact truth is. Part of the fee structure to hire these people will be to tax and license farm equipment, and charge us for rezoning Ag land, but then, they say they want to help farmers. What is the truth?
I really felt picked on when I found out about the Dedicated Open-Space on our property until I started looking at the rest of the township. Now, I feel worse for a lot of you people, because you have it way worse than we do, and most of you don't even know it. That is the purpose for my letter. Make no mistake, I love living in the country. I do not want to see our township built up, but please, start asking questions to Dane County Planning and Zoning and the Dane County Board. Ask to see the maps, take time to read the documents (and not the white washed version on the Town website). Once they are approved and the comprehensive plan is approved, it will be too late. Don't be like other townships, where they have passed the plan, and are now are asking questions about losing their land owner rights. Our Township has to have this plan completed by 2010, or the county is going to do it for us. Time for this is running out so please do it now.
I have a list of links and more information if anybody is interested.
Thank You
Cindi Haack

[Gib Docken]

Cindi
Great information in your comment. Our town board could easily pass a land use plan that satisfies the state requirements and that is staightforward and easy to understand. And it could be very short. So far the steering committee is chosing to be very careful and cover all bases in the discussion. That is good. But the final document does not need to include things covered by county codes, ordinances, long range plans, etc. And it certainly doesn't need to be vague or misleading.
Look at the work it took you to learn about countly land use restrictions. It shouldn't be that hard to know what our political leaders want for us and our lands.
Primrose is as bad as the county in the way they handle land use. We don't say we don't want developement but that is how the town board and the plannning commission operate. I agree with the results, but not the way they do it! Its not right or fair the way it is done. Changing the county is a big job, but changing the way our town operates would be a lot easier. And it would save the board and planning commission a ton of work and expenditure of our tax dollars.

[Cindi Haack]

Thanks for responding Gib,
I think We need to establish a happy medium here. I want Primrose to remain Ag as much as possible, but we need to do it using some good old common sense!! What we dont need to have happen is for the County/state to drive the price of our property down and when we cant find buyers the government will offer to buy, using TDRs, and give us little or nothing for it. This is not speculation, this is happening now in other areas.

I decided that I had to share what I found because most of this info is buried in so many Committee Documents, Web sites and different entities sites that most people wont find them. What I found is just the tip of the iceberg, and I think the government is counting on the fact that most of the public wont find this information. I also dont like what the County is doing by "Guiding" the Townships into accepting their Comprehensive Plan by asking the Townships to approve maps and what ever without showing us the whole picture.

The term "Police Power" shocked me the most.The next was the fact that the County is just going to come in and "take" or "use" the rest our property that they want regardless of the things we have done here.. As far as I can tell, there is no ordinance, no Statute, no administrative code and nothing else that has been passed to date, but we have already been told that we cannot build on that lot, which is a parcel of property in the Village of Mt Vernon. So, my lesson learned is that "No good Deed goes unpunished"

[Bill Haack]

Dedicated open spaces, View Scrapes, open space corridors, etc., as proposed in the Dane County Comp Plan will give the county almost total control of all development in Primrose. It will also give the County the ability to add grass prairies, oak Savannahs, in to our Comp Plan to further limit development. It essentially takes Local Control and gives it to the county.

In 1981 Primrose went from one house per acre owned to one house per 35 acres owned. If Primrose lowers their acres from 4 acres to 2 acres, it has and will continue to ensure every 33 of 35 acres wall be held in perpetuity as wetlands, dedicated open spaces, view scapes , open space corridors, environmental and wild life corridors, oak Savannahs, etc. This Comp Plan as proposed by Dane County takes away local township control and puts into county control. If Primrose excepts this plan as written by Dane County It will reduce the value of all or ,most of the densities by a substantial amount. TDR or PDR's will be of little value if the development has been taken away with these other proposals. Primrose, and the rest of Dane County who wish to continue Farmland preservation need to help to get the Farmers PDR's or TDR's or let the owner developed his densities. Even the Federal Government says that you cannot have Farmland Preservation with out the farmers.. I think PDRs are one way to help farmers to Farm in Primrose, and help to ensure farming in Primrose.The only alternative, in my opinion. is to change the title of our plan from Farmland Preservation to Parks and Open spaces.

And remember, You cant have Farmland Preservation with out the farmers!

William Haack
PLannng Commissions Chair for
The Town of Primrose