Preservation of the renowned landscape surrounding Lexington is also preservation of an economic driver that is ever changing but true to its rural roots, according to the director of Lexington's Purchase of Development Rights (PDR) program.
"We're looking at farmland as a basis for the future in what types of agriculture that we're going to have," said Billy Van Pelt, director of the PDR program. "We keep hearing more about Alltech and things that are being done with bio-refineries, and their first bio-refinery is going to open in Washington County, and that's going to use farmland for feed, fuel and food.
"Agriculture is an evolving industry, and we need to have that base of land ready for agriculture today, 50 years from now, and 100 years from now," Van Pelt said, following a press conference marking the 20,000th acre to come into the PDR program since it began nearly eight years ago.
The 20,000-acre milestone marked 40 percent of the PDR program's mandated goal of 50,000 acres by 2020. Van Pelt takes pride in the pace of efforts to preserve Lexington's scenic backdrop. But there are more interested farmers than the city can afford to take into the program that allows farmers' to work their fields as usual, but permanently bars development on the covered acreage.
"Our current challenge," according to Margaret Graves, chair of the Fayette County Rural Land Management Board that oversees PDR, "is to meet the demand from farmers eager to participate in the program. We currently have 49 farms in the pipeline, representing 2,735 acres, and more farmers are expected to apply in January. To buy easements from these farmers who have already applied for the program would require an additional $6.8 million.
So far the city has invested $21.6 million in the program