How I hate driving on super highways, especially when I'm in my little Miata convertible. Fortunately I live in a great place - even driving to the airport involves mostly back roads and beautiful countryside.
Litchfield County has a great deal of open space. I was given a report a few weeks ago of statistics for our area. It included protected lands in 25 of the 27 towns in the county (excluding New Hartford and Barkhamsted) plus Sherman, which is in Fairfield County. Turns out this area has 20.3% of the total lands in the state protected from development.
When I looked at the list of towns I was thrilled to see that my town topped the list, but quickly realized it wasn't North Canaan but Falls Village (listed by its technically correct name, Canaan) that had 45% of its land protected. That's a total of 9,565 acres, which includes Robbins Swamp and a large section of Canaan Mountain.
Sharon has the largest number of protected acres, 11,564, which amounts to 30.2% of their town, while Norfolk runs a close second with 10,799 acres. That represents a higher percentage of their town, 36.3%. Much of that land is on Canaan Mountain and was sold to the state by the Great Mountain Forest. It also includes a large piece of land bordering Locust Hill which is owned by my neighbor, Terry Betteridge.
Bethlehem is at the bottom of the list. It has 563 protected acres, only 4.5% of the town. My town, North Canaan, is listed as having just 2,070 acres of land protected from development, a mere 16% of its total acreage. One reason the percentage is low is that farms aren't counted as open space since they aren't necessarily protected.
We have 8 viable farms in North Canaan. That acreage would bring our total up to almost 6000 acres. We are extremely fortunately to still have so many farms. The other towns in Litchfield county have seen their farms vanish one after another over the past 40 years. Although a town makes little revenue from farms, as their taxes are reduced by the state's Public Act #490, they are a financial boon in other ways.
A study of land use in Connecticut towns made several years ago found that the net return on each tax dollar after municipal expenses such as roads, sewers, schools, etc. went like this - residential land brings in about 36 cents, commercial and industrial land 48 cents, but farm and forest lands bring in $1.06.
The biggest benefits of farm and forest land, however, are the rural character and handsome landscapes they offer. It's hard to find many places in Connecticut where you can see cows or corn or calf hutches any more. Uh, oh, those notorious calf hutches. So many people think they're used to house calves being raised for veal that I have to just stop here and set the record straight.
The calves tethered to these boxes are a dairy farm's future milk cows. They have nothing to do with veal. And their hutches aren't little boxes. They're seven feet long and three feet wide, deep enough to protect the calf from winter wind and summer sun. They have a large door facing south, a window facing north and a vented ridge pole. Before they were invented, newborn calves were tethered in the barn where they were prone to bacterial diseases and respiratory infections. Their mortality rate was very high, but no one worried about it but the farmers.
OK, that's straightened out. Let's get back to open space. If you have open land, there are many options to insure that it remains undeveloped. Selling it to a conservation organization such as The Nature Conservancy, a local land trust or the state is one, provided you find a willing buyer. Giving it to such a group or acquiring an easement on the property are other option.
I no longer own Locust Hill's 250 acres, having given it to my three daughtrers to avoid estate taxes. Fortunately I trust them all and feel sure I will continue to look out at beautiful meadows and pastureland until I die. Then they can do what they want, but hopefully it will be to protect it all from developers.
