In recent news, West Newbury Town Meeting has passed a Right to Farm Bylaw and voted to establish an Agricultural Committee (an advisory board without the powers that Mass General Laws Chapter 40, Section 8L confers on Agricultural Commissions). The Billerica Town Meeting also passed a Right to Farm Bylaw.
Stan Ingram of the Falmouth Agricultural Commission reports that they are working on a number of projects, including the caretaking of a cranberry bog, managing or assisting with the Falmouth community gardens, searching for funds for Right to Farm signs, working with the Health Department to revise town stable regulations, developing a town Farmland Action Plan, considering asking Town Meeting to approve a 1% annual contribution from the Community Preservation Act to an Agricultural Fund, and compiling a list of vulnerable farm properties to watch for farmland protection opportunities. The AgCom is also in the process of co-holding (with The 300 Committee Land Trust and on behalf of the Town of Falmouth) a new farmland Conservation Restriction on a 6-acre parcel being acquired by the group called Farming Falmouth.
Owning farmland and holding CRs is a relatively new possibility for Agricultural Commissions, pursuant to MGL Ch. 40, Sec. 8L.
All of the above could be models for other Agricultural Commissions around the state. We plan to discuss these and other initiatives at a series of roundtables this coming summer and fall, beginning with a July 20 Agricultural Event at the Westport Fairgrounds. For more information about that event, contact Sue Guiducci of the Westport Agricultural Commission, sguiducci10@gmail.com or 508-496-9914.
Sarah Gardner and Pete Westover, MDAR AgCom Project