{"id":38746,"date":"2014-10-02T16:51:34","date_gmt":"2014-10-02T21:51:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=38746"},"modified":"2014-10-07T15:27:46","modified_gmt":"2014-10-07T20:27:46","slug":"texas-lost-over-1-million-acres-of-farm-and-ranch-land-in-15-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2014\/10\/02\/texas-lost-over-1-million-acres-of-farm-and-ranch-land-in-15-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Lost Over 1 Million Acres Of Private Farm and Ranch Land In 15 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_24858\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"Juan Rico culls cotton plants growing between rows in an irrigated cotton field July 27, 2011 near Hermleigh, Texas. A new bill would require most farmers to report their water usage to the state. \" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2013\/03\/119977560.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-24858\" alt=\"Juan Rico culls cotton plants growing between rows in an irrigated cotton field July 27, 2011 near Hermleigh, Texas. A new bill would require most farmers to report their water usage to the state. \" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2013\/03\/119977560-300x200.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2013\/03\/119977560-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2013\/03\/119977560.jpg 594w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Photo by Scott Olson\/Getty Images<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Juan Rico culls cotton plants growing between rows in an irrigated cotton field July 27, 2011 near Hermleigh, Texas.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Talk of Texas often conjures images of wide open ranch land and farmers at work their fields. But that iconic territory is being lost, according to a new analysis.<\/p>\n<p>Dr. Roel Lopez, director for <a href=\"http:\/\/irnr.tamu.edu\/\">Texas A&amp;M Institute of Renewable Natural Resources<\/a>, says\u00a0the state lost over 1 million acres of privately-owned farm land and forest land between 1997-2012. He presented the information this week at a conference of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.txaglandtrust.org\/\">Texas Agricultural Land Trust,<\/a> a nonprofit conservation group.<\/p>\n<p>The conference, called &#8220;No Land No Water,&#8221; focused on what Lopez believes are inefficient and unsustainable landowning trends in Texas\u2019 flourishing economy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn the past 15 years, we\u2019ve seen a little over a million acres of working lands converted to other uses,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n<p>Land conversion can mean more than a loss of grazing space and pretty views. Lopez worries it will further\u00a0impede water recharge by replacing soft, absorptive ground cover with impenetrable material, like road cement.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->So how can rural property owners protect land and water from development? The remainder of speakers at the conference suggested conservation easements as a viable answer. The Texas Agricultural Land Trust is one of several groups that works with landowners in securing and enforcing easements<\/p>\n<p><div class=\"related-content alignleft\"><h4 class=\"related-header\">Related<\/h4><div class=\"links\"><h5>Posts<\/h5><ul><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2013\/06\/06\/why-texas-cattle-ranching-continues-to-decline\/\">Why Texas Cattle Ranching Continues to Decline<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2013\/02\/26\/with-water-in-the-spotlight-texas-agriculture-stakes-its-claim\/\">With Water in the Spotlight, Texas Agriculture Stakes Its Claim<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/10\/17\/after-drought-some-texas-ranchers-wary-of-rebuilding\/\">After Drought, Some Texas Ranchers Wary of Rebuilding<\/a><\/li><li class=\"link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/04\/06\/a-generation-of-texas-farmers-lost-to-the-drought\/\">A Generation of Texas Farmers and Ranchers, Lost to the Drought<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/div><div class=\"topics\"><h5>Topics<\/h5><p class=\"topic\"><a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/topic\/ranching\/\">Texas Ranching<\/a><\/p><\/div><\/div>\u201cA conservation easement is an agreement between a landholder and a qualified trustee,\u201d Allison Elder, a representative of the trust, says. \u201cIt\u2019s designed to permanently protect the special natural resources of the property.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Basically, landowners donate their property to groups that will promote conservation upon the donated land. To accomplish this, trusties focus on removing certain rights from land titles they\u2019re given.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cTypically it\u2019s going to be the right to subdivide,\u201d says Elder, \u201cthe right to do a lot of intense commercial or industrial uses.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Naturally, these restrictions reduce the monetary value of the protected land. To offset that landowners may receive tax benefits if their easement meets certain requirements.<\/p>\n<p>To exemplify the potential success of conservation easements, Dr. Francine Romero, chairman of San Antonio\u2019s Conservation Advisory Board, described an easement-driven policy San Antonio has used to protect over 126,000 acres, or about 25%, of the Edwards Aquifer recharge zone in Bexar, Medina and Uvlade counties.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe <a href=\"http:\/\/www.tceq.state.tx.us\/field\/eapp\/program.html\">Edwards Aquifer Protection Program<\/a> purchases land, by conservation easements, on our recharge zone,\u201d she says. In 2000, San Antonio voters approved the program to use a fraction of the city\u2019s 8.25% sales tax to protect their largest source of drinking water.<\/p>\n<p>Although that program has been successful in securing land, it may not be enough to keep up with the city&#8217;s booming population and continued drought. \u00a0Romero is concerned council members and voters won\u2019t reelect the program for sales tax funding in 2015.<\/p>\n<p>The city is also considering investing in<a href=\"http:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2014\/09\/30\/san-antonio-one-step-closer-controversial-pipeline\/\"> a multi-billion dollar water pipeline<\/a> project from Burleson County to bring water in from the Carrizo-Wilcox aquifer.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Talk of Texas often conjures images of wide open ranch land and farmers at work their fields. But that iconic territory is being lost, according to a new analysis. Dr. Roel Lopez, director for Texas A&amp;M Institute of Renewable Natural Resources, says\u00a0the state lost over 1 million acres of privately-owned farm land and forest land [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":175,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[60],"tags":[199],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38746"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/175"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38746"}],"version-history":[{"count":29,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38746\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38773,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38746\/revisions\/38773"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}