generations. The family says local growth has led to more customers, but they’re watching closely as the agricultural landscape in Lee County shrinks. Photo by Ben Brown
As more and more residential and business developments eye Lee County, the area is losing cropland at a much faster pace than the rest of the state
By Gordon Anderson
gordon@rantnc.com
When the Sanford City Council approved the Vermillion residential development last July, a familiar set of events played out.
Vermillion, to be the county’s largest-ever housing development, will consist of 1,233 homes on 470 acres near the intersection of U.S. 1 and Colon Road. It will occupy a part of Sanford that not very many years ago wasn’t even in the city limits, but today includes the Central Carolina Enterprise Park, Sanford’s newest fire station, and the Galvin’s Ridge subdivision (which at 1,219 lots held that “largest-ever housing development” distinction for Sanford before Vermillion came along). There are new commercial developments already in the planning stages for properties that line that Colon Road exit, developments that are expected to include a convenience store, fast food options, a larger restaurant, and other establishments yet to be determined.
Many in the area haven’t been pleased with that kind of rapid change, and the familiar set of circumstances that surrounded the Vermillion approval was the public expression of that feeling.
“We are a rural county. Everyone knows that. If you want to live in the city, then live in the city and please don’t bring the city to us,” Cindy Simpson, a Riddle Road resident who addressed the council in July, said at the meeting. “We don’t need more industry here. What’s wrong with the people who are here? They’ve been here forever. This will likely result in our property taxes doubling. I live on a fixed income. I only get by as it is. How can I live on a fixed income and pay double what I am already paying in taxes? I can carry my own trash off.”
Simpson’s comments — right or wrong — reflect a line of thinking that’s common in the area with regards to development, particularly residential development. Change and growth go hand-in-hand, and there’s a good number of people in the affected areas who just don’t like or want either.
The reactions to this change have manifested themselves in a lot of what are almost talking points, particularly on social media: “our schools are already overcrowded,” or “we don’t have the infrastructure,” or “we’re losing all our farms.”
These talking points aren’t always correct — there’s plenty of capacity in Lee County’s schools, actually, and unless you mean more shopping capacity by “infrastructure,” we’re doing alright on that front too — but the last one about the shrinking landscape for agriculture has at least a basis in fact.
Manufacturing has been a staple of Lee County’s economy since before it was Lee County, but farming and agriculture were obviously here first and have remained an important part of the business landscape (“Lee County’s European and African settlers had been agriculturists in their homelands, and so farming naturally developed as the mainstay of the local economy during the 1700s and early 1800s,” reads J. Daniel Pezzoni’s The History and Architecture of Lee County, published in 1995. “The Highland Scots cultivated corn, wheat, peas, beans, sweet potatoes, and flax on their farms”). While direct farming employment accounts for about one and a half percent of local jobs, the broader category of agribusiness brings that number to about 13 percent.
But growth and other factors have eaten into that quite a bit over the years. U.S. Census data shows that cropland in Lee County declined from 19,534 acres in 2017 to 14,187 (27 percent) in 2022, and total farmland decreased from 35,062 acres to 31,204 (11 percent) in the same time period. That 11 percent loss far outpaces the statewide number — about 4 percent — over the same stretch.
Another telling metric via Lee County GIS system — there are 709 fewer square acres of “vacant” land today than there were in 2005. That comes to about 11 square miles, and in a county with only 258 of those, it’s a significant number.
Development isn’t the only cause of that loss, and the numbers available don’t always refer specifically to farmland (“vacant” in GIS speak means just that — no buildings), but there’s no questioning that time and progress have eaten into local farmland, even if they’re not looking to do away with it altogether.
And although farmland is demonstrably getting smaller and smaller, that doesn’t mean local leaders haven’t done anything about it. Lee County in particular has introduced the use of several tools that promote and incentivize the preservation of farmlands — Voluntary Agricultural Districts (VAD), Enhanced Voluntary Agricultural Districts (EVAD), and conservation easements.
VADs are agreements that — like their name states — are voluntary, and technically nonbinding. The land in question is required to be used for farming, horticulture or forestry and meet minimum acreage standards, and landowners agree in principle to limit use of their property to agricultural pursuits and receive recognition that their property is designated for agricultural use. This helps owners avoid things like nuisance complaints about noise, dust or other byproducts of an agricultural operation, and gives them a say in public decisions about how farmland around the county is used.
EVADs go a step further, requiring a formal commitment to enter a conservation agreement that’s typically irrevocable for at least a decade and automatically renews for additional terms unless they’re explicitly canceled. In exchange, the landowners gain priority access to various grant funding, potential waivers on utility assessments, and other protections.
Conservation easements go the furthest — they’re legally binding agreements that permanently limit development within certain parameters while maintaining private control of the land in question and opening access to various reductions in the tax burden. If a farmer wants their farm to stay a farm in perpetuity, a voluntary conservation easement is the surest shot to getting there — the conservation easement remains in place even if they eventually choose to sell their property. The Lee County Board of Commissioners established conservation easement procedures in March of this year.
Kirk Smith, chairman of the Lee County Board of Commissioners, said the decline in farmland isn’t a new problem.
“(Recently) at the Central Pines Regional Council of Governments, we were privy to review a historical report from 1983. One of the top items of concern was the encroachment on our agricultural and forestry lands. Here we are 42 years later and the encroachment on productive farm lands continues unabated,” he said in a statement. “This past March we unanimously approved the Agricultural Board’s recommendation to establish the Enhanced Voluntary Agricultural District. A majority of the Lee County Board of Commissioners agreed to establish a Conservation Easement Fund to offset those costs to the land owner that are beyond state and federal funding grants. Those funds would cover attorney fees, appraisal, surveys, and boundary signage necessary to establish a conservation easement. The county continues to see pressures on our land by the ever increasing demand for housing and apartment developments.”
The county board will have a chance soon to weigh in soon on a few pieces of land that are looking to take advantage of the new programs. The Triangle Land Conservancy, a non-profit land trust that strives to create a healthier and more vibrant Triangle region by safeguarding clean water, protecting natural habitats, supporting local farms, and connecting people with nature through land protection and stewardship, catalyzing community action and collaboration is expected to present to the board three properties totaling hundreds of acres that hope to eventually be Conservation Easements. TLC is asking the county to allocate dollars from its farmland preservation trust fund — paid for using “rollback taxes” from land being sold out of farm use for development — that cover the associated costs.
“Lee County is known for its beautiful farms, which have also been economic drivers for generations. Over the past few years, TLC has increased our conservation efforts in Lee County, helping maintain the beautiful and economically important rural character of the county as it grows. We have worked closely with farmers, resource professionals, and county staff to advocate for local investment in farmland preservation,” Sandy Sweitzer, executive director of TLC told The Rant. “Conservation easements allow farmers to maintain ownership of their land, knowing that it will be their legacy, even as it transitions to future generations. We are excited to be working with three families on preserving their farms, ranging from produce to timber to traditional row crops, and hope to continue expanding our conservation efforts in Lee County.”
TLC has been protecting wild and working lands in a six-county region since 1983, and has protected more than 25,000 acres across Chatham, Lee, Orange, Durham, Johnston, and Wake Counties — more than 8,000 acres of which are farms under private ownership with conservation easements held by TLC.
For Bill Stone, director of the Lee County Cooperative Extension, the question isn’t about whether Lee County should be pro development or anti development, but how leaders here can continue to strike a balance that’s been in place for decades.
“One of the things that’s made us attractive to industry is that we’ve been able to strike that balance, and it’s just really important to keep it,” he said. “The assumption with some people you talk to is that people in agriculture are going to be anti-growth, which isn’t the case. They know that having a population interested in and willing to buy locally grown products is so important, which keeps bringing me back to that balance. You see a lot of folks who have been successful, and that type of interest from the public is what’s allowed us to pursue projects like the Agricultural Marketplace downtown.”
Anna and Troy Jackson are the latest generation to raise crops and livestock on the lands around White Hill Farms, which consists of more than 700 acres that sit on the Lee-Moore county line along U.S. 15-501 between Sanford and Carthage. The brother and sister team’s roots go deep in the property.
“Our dad started this farm when he graduated from N.C. State in 1987,” Troy Jackson said. “But our family’s been farming around here forever.”
The years have led to some changes around White Hill Farm in 2018 — mostly because of damage done during hurricane season — and shifted toward crop public facing crop production. They opened a produce stand that sits by the highway and serves the public seven days a week.
The Jacksons aren’t in danger of losing their farm to development. They own much of the property in Lee and Moore counties, and while they lease the rest, their revamped business model is humming along well, and they both plan to keep at it well into the future. But with deep roots in both the area and the area’s agriculture community, they’re both closely watching what’s happening in Lee County and the greater area.
They both stress they’re not against growth and not against development — “the more people that live here, the more customers we’ll have,” Anna points out — but they see how farmland turning into houses changes things as well.
“The development they’re doing on (N.C. Highway) 78 — that’s a fine place to develop. There’s gonna be growth in Lee County,” Troy said. “The issue people have is when they come to areas like this and take up fields that used to be a pasture. To a lot of people it doesn’t make much sense when someone buys up a 20 acre field and put houses every half acre.”
Anna said growth doesn’t just take up cropland, it also makes farming more expensive.
“If we have 500 acres in production, we’re paying property taxes on all that, so it’s a struggle to fight with that,” she said. “Growth coming raises a lot of those kinds of (financial issues) for us.”
Troy said farming takes space, and too much pressure on space creates a challenge. “We live completely off the farm,” he said. “To do that, you’ve gotta have land.”
To understand the development-agriculture balance, one also must hear from developers. Many represent out of town interests, but many live here or at least have deep ties — and it’s unfair to suggest they want anything bad for Sanford and Lee County.
Tom Darden, one of three property owners in the Vermillion project, spoke to the Sanford City Council at that meeting in July about his family’s roots in the area. His grandfather was the president of Cherokee Brick Company in the 1950s, a business that was passed on to his father in the mid-1980s. Darden’s first subdivision project was in Sanford in 2005.
“This community means a great deal to me and my family, and we care a great deal about what we build here,” he said at the meeting.
In addition to the Vermillion site, Darden told the council that his family owns “another 850 acres on both sides of Colon Road in the immediate vicinity of (Vermillion). We are approaching these properties with care and deliberation, working closely with the city and community to determine the best path forward.”
He continued that conversations with companies that might ultimately choose to locate operations here made it abundantly clear that the key to attracting top-quality industries is high-quality housing.
“Much of the area surrounding this site is very suitable, and very attractive, for industrial development in the short term,” he said.
Jimmy Randolph is the CEO of the Sanford Area Growth Alliance, the local economic development organization which works to attract new industry to the area, so he’s well-versed in the issues surrounding development. But he’s also involved with TLC and is passionate about preservation, and he’s a strong proponent of the idea that preservation is actually a part of attracting the industry that helps to grow a community’s tax base.
“When I think about the role talent plays in the process for companies seeking the best possible site for their industry, quality of place is a critical factor,” he said. “Aesthetics, the value of open space, the culture and traditions – those are all components. “We allude to all of those things in the context of their ability to attract top talent from around the world, and through the local talent pipeline. Human beings are making those decisions, and they’re thinking about the future of their own existence. SAGA is committed to a serious, sustainable future. And we have to be, or we’re going to find ourselves missing out on the future we want to have.”
Sanford real estate agent Steve Malloy told the council at the same meeting that the Vermillion site is an excellent location for a development of this size and type.
“Many of the locations inside the present city limits are not big enough to do a project of this size, either because the owners are not willing to sell, or because the topography presents challenges that are just too difficult to overcome,” he told the council.
Lloyd Smith is a Lee County native who owns a small, 20-acre farm in the Broadway area. He serves on the Lee County Agricultural Commission (which approved the recommendation of the Conservation Easement projects the TLC is expected to propose this fall), where he’s particularly interested in issues surrounding agricultural land use. He hopes to see more conversations at the leadership level across the entire community about what can be done to grow what needs to grow and preserve what needs to be preserved.
“What the city wants and what the agricultural community wants – those things can be at odds,” he told The Rant. “But finding a balance, it seems like it can be done. But we keep running along parallel lines, and we don’t connect.”
Additional reporting by Richard Sullins
Great Article..
Land is a hot commodity, especially in one’s own family…
Kudos for these young farmers who continue to keep it in the family and produce from the land that they’ve had for generations. I personally commend them as I purchase fresh produce and such year-round from all local peoples.
We appreciate you……