The Columbia County Board of Supervisors took actions related to land use Wednesday, but an issue that the board crossed off its agenda is likely to affect many farmland owners who might be considering selling their land for non-agricultural uses.
Included in the agenda for the supervisors' monthly meeting - but later removed at the request of Chairwoman Debra Wopat - was a proposed ordinance that would have incorporated into the county's laws the amounts per acre that the state's Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection will charge, beginning in 2010, every time agriculture land is rezoned for a non-agricultural use.
They're called conversion fees, and Planning and Zoning Director John Bluemke said the fees must be charged regardless of whether they're specified in a county ordinance.
The county won't get any of the money from the fees. It all would go to the state to help pay for land preservation programs.
The conversion fee is one component of the Working Lands Initiative, which became Wisconsin law last summer when it was adopted as part of the state's budget. The law is designed to preserve the state's agricultural land.
Bluemke said the ordinance had been proposed to let landowners in all 21 Columbia County towns know how much, per acre, the state would charge to anyone who asked to rezone agriculture land to some other use.
But the fees set in the proposed ordinances - ranging from $942 to $1,014 per acre, depending on the town - were based on 2009 valuations through the Wisconsin Department of Revenue, and therefore would not accurately reflect the fees that would be charged, Bluemke said.
The fees are computed, Bluemke said, based on the values of farmland in each town.
Based on the Department of Revenue's most recent valuation, the conversion fees would range from $924 per acre in the town of Fountain Prairie to $1,029 per acre in the town of Pacific.
The Working Lands Initiative allows counties to add their own charges to the conversion fees to help pay for the county's costs of collecting them. Columbia County is not proposing doing that, Bluemke said.
"We have to charge the conversion fees for the state," he said, "It's an expensive process as it is, without us adding another fee."
In another zoning-related matter, the supervisors adopted, with some dissent, an amendment to the comprehensive plan that the supervisors adopted two years ago, to reconcile differences between the plan and the actual zoning decisions made since the plan was put in place.
Supervisor Jack Sanderson of Columbus asked how much of the revision was based on the Federal Emergency Management Agency's most recent designations of flood plains. Bluemke's answer said that is, indeed, one of the reasons for the revisions.
If that's the case, Sanderson said, then why can't the county zoning department conduct its own research to determine whether the land is, in fact, in a flood plain?
Bluemke replied that FEMA's designations are in place, and there's little, if anything, that the county can realistically do to question or contest the designations.
He added that no one attended a Dec. 1 public hearing on the proposed comprehensive plan amendments, which were set forth in a 25-page document composed almost entirely of land use maps.
It's important, Bluemke said, that information on the county's planning maps and its zoning maps be reconciled. The comprehensive plan amendment would reflect zoning changes that the supervisors had already voted to approve.
Supervisor John Tramburg of Fall River said he trusts the work of both the County Board's planning and zoning committee and the planning and zoning office staff.
However, some supervisors said they would have preferred to take some more time to study the proposed changes, and the voice vote to adopt the changes included some "nays."
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Next meeting: Columbia Care Center
When the Columbia County Board of Supervisors convenes on Jan. 20, it won't be in its usual gathering place, the Branch I courtroom at the Columbia County Courthouse.
Instead, the supervisors will convene at the Columbia Care Center in Wyocena - a session that will include pre- and post-meeting tours of the facility, and possibly the option for the supervisors to buy lunches prepared by the care center's dietary department.
Supervisor John Tramburg of Fall River, a member of the County Board's care center committee, said holding the meeting there would give all 30 supervisors an opportunity to view the facility up close.
"I think it would be well to have as many supervisors as possible make a tour, to see how the county's resources are applied, and to see the local support we get from volunteers that help at the center," he said.
The meeting will convene at 9:45 a.m. Jan. 20, but Chairwoman Debra Wopat of Rio said tours lasting 30 to 40 minutes will be offered at 9 a.m., and again after the meeting adjourns.
The care center is located at 323 E. Monroe St. (county Highway G) in the village of Wyocena.