You can’t go back in time.
Still, as area counties struggle with growth, that’s what some government officials would like to do.
Culpeper County, for instance, is considering changing its zoning ordinance in a manner that would make growth almost as restrictive as in neighboring Rappahannock County, which requires 20 acres to build a house (somewhat smaller parcels on steep mountainsides).
The problem is that Rappahannock, which remains almost exclusively rural, except for several picturesque hamlets, made its zoning changes in 1960, shortly after the county’s only subdivision was built on Chester Gap (on the Warren County line).
Now Culpeper is seeking to do the same, despite the fact that it is 65 years behind Rappahannock and its countryside is already dotted with minor subdivisions.
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The object is to maintain and preserve farmland, to make sure those pretty board fences that enclose green fields dotted with Angus cows and calves never go away. Tourists and those who have moved to Culpeper from the city expect them to be there so they can “ooh” and “aah” as they drive past.
Proponents of Culpeper’s proposed 20-acre-lot zoning ordinance point to Rappahannock, where wild blackberry patches that existed 50 years ago are still in place today. What they don’t seem to understand is that, with some exceptions, the farms of its neighboring county are owned by outsiders, gentlemen farmers who can afford the high-priced land and who pay someone else to do the work.
And they don’t seem to understand that the local people have been priced off the land in Rappahannock. Except for grandfathered lots — which almost always get swept up by city folks looking for a weekend home, there is little or no land that the vast majority of local people can afford. Remember, rural Rappahannock has no industry.
Local people, like outsiders, need a place to live. Each year Culpeper’s two high schools produce about 350 graduates. Those 700 graduates theoretically translate into 350 couples and new households, and these people need homes.
That’s 350 more housing units needed every single year, some 3,500 in 10 years. These houses or apartments must be built somewhere. Yes, many of these graduates move elsewhere, but no matter where they go, they will need a place to live. In restricting lot size, Culpeper will be putting land prices out of reach for locals — especially low-income families — and throwing the problem into someone else’s backyard.
Maintaining farmland is a good thing, but farms need farmers and fewer and fewer young people want to be at the mercy of the banks and the weather. Along the 10-mile stretch of road where I live, there are only five farms left. Most of the owners are in their 70s and 80s and have no children to take over when they die.
Contrary to the popular belief, most farmers are not rich. In many cases, land represents their only wealth, their life savings. To tell them that they cannot sell the land as they desire is in effect stealing their inheritance.
A 20-acre lot is wasted land. It is too much to tend as a yard and too little to farm. In fact, anything larger than a three- or five-acre building lot is wasted space. I live in a subdivision with 10-acre lots that are mowing headaches.
Yes, some of the few remaining farmers need land to rent, but they are not going to drag expensive equipment 10 miles down a busy road for five acres of hay. I know. I’ve done it. So, the land lays fallow, benefiting only the taxman and the lawn mower salesmen.
Culpeper’s proposed new zoning ordinance would affect approximately 90% of the county, excluding only land around the town. Yes, it would limit growth, but it would also deny existing farmers control of their future land sales, and, with supply and demand, it would put home prices — already skyrocketing — out of the reach of the local working family.
Culpeper, like Stafford, Spotsylvania, Warren, Frederick and several Maryland counties, are doomed to grow because they are within a 60-mile radius of Washington and Northern Virginia, where the high-paying jobs exist.
These counties have and will continue to grow and change. Your children, my children — everybody’s children — have to live somewhere.
Rappahannock County is an anomaly. It made the zoning changes long before the rush to the suburbs began. Counties like Spotsylvania, Stafford and Culpeper didn’t.
Unfortunately, these counties will never be rural again.
Donnie Johnston’s columns appear twice per week on the Opinion page. Reach him at djohn40330@aol.com.