spicy porkReason being?
It seems like each and every plot of productive farmland sold gets slathered with houses within three weeks. Quite depressing. The whole area is starting to look like a giant suburb. I'm seeing fewer and fewer pastures and more and more real-estate signs popping up every morning that I ride the school bus.
I thought I was getting away from that when I moved from Seattle to the country. I didn't expect suburbia to follow me. The thing that really gets to me is the fact that land prices have skyrocketed, meaning only rich Californians can move in. They don't mind at all if this turns into a giant parking lot.
There is a solution of sorts, though not a very permenant one. It's called a buyers excise tax. It's where one-half of one percent of the money made by selling property or houses gets pooled together and is spent on purchasing development rights from existing farms, ensuring that they stay in agriculture forever. The tax, called Proposition 1 goes on the ballot this year for my county.
Honestly now, there's no liberal plot to destroy America in this idea. It even ties into core Republican values.
Which is why it made absolute perfect sense that the Washington State Realtors' Association dumped 85,000 dollars into fighting this plan.
Why oh why does my Japan trip have to be now of all times. Just when I need to fundraising for my foreign exchange program, I learn that the B.E.T. campaign has been all but financially tackled. We can possibly pull this off, but I might actually have to miss a few practices in order to go doorbelling.
The most ironic thing is that Port Angeles, the real battleground for this initiative, has nothing to do with farming OR selling homes. In fact, the Buyer's Excise Tax will probably have no effect the people there whatsoever. However, the word 'tax' just seems to have a negative air around it.
I met the guy who was in charge of this whole campaign last night at a barn dance his business was hosting. He's tired. Too tired. The poor man has been working on this since March AND has been managing a farm plus his organic food store. He even said himself that it's his final push. Hell, it's probably our last chance anyhow.
Sequim valley is loosing about a thousand acres of prime farmland a year. At best, the B.E.T. will save about 1500 acres of land over the course of 10 years. Not a whole lot, but that'll be one thousand more acres of land that we know will never be diverted away from agriculture.
So my plea for everyone who reads this is to know your local initiatives. Know them, and change the world you live in.
One acre at a time.
