Dear Editor:
I am very proud of San Benito County ranchers and farmers for their fortitude and longevity. SBC is one of the most beautiful and serene areas in the country, and we thank our agricultural community partially for that.
I am a rancher, farmer and ranch broker born and raised here. I evaluate ranches and work with their owner’s day in and day out in the county.
This initiative will absolutely hurt the agricultural community. Loss of property value and borrowing is inevitable. The entire county should be reassessed at a lower rate, making things worse for county coffers.
Worse yet, are the underlying and more devastating restrictions that will take affect it passed. For example, a rancher would be required to go for a vote of the people to grade even a short section of road across a slope which is 30 percent or greater. The majority of our rural county roads would not even qualify. This is one example of many problems with this initiative.
We are currently working with conservancy groups and private individuals in this area interested in preserving thousands of acres where they pay a fair market value to the rancher.
This is how you preserve agriculture. These are real opportunities that are happening now. This initiative robs the rancher of this option. If the promoters of the initiative can obtain all the development rights for the low cost of a ballot vote approximately $250,000, they will save thousands of millions of dollars at the expense of our agricultural community. Most ranchers do not want to see their land developed, but nobody wants to have their property taken.
A retired Stanford law professor wrote this initiative. Out-of-town signature gathers that never turned a shovel in this county have misled people while gathering signatures. This initiative is merely a selfish dream of individuals and conservation groups who have nothing to lose but are so called experts on agriculture.
Agricultural families have scratched out a living for generations and have financial, retirement plans and life savings invested in their properties. This initiative will ruin some family operations. Ranchers may lose the opportunity to have their children continue on with the family farm. One by one, the San Benito County ranch families will disappear.
If you vote for this initiative, you will unfairly punish the agricultural backbone of this community. The current county general plan already has a 1-percent growth cap in place, which allows for approximately 56 new units annually and some 582,000 acres under Williamson Act preservation.
The planning department will not let you develop prime farm ground. Read the sign when you enter Tres Pinos. It reads “Next service 76 miles.” There is no reason to rush into an initiative that will be so detrimental to agriculture, SBC’s No. 1 industry.
If this initiative is so great for agriculture, why are there no ranchers or farmers supporting it? Don’t be fooled by this so called agricultural initiative.
I urge you to listen to the San Benito County Farm Bureau and the San Benito County Cattleman Association and follow their lead. If you can support this initiative and sleep at night comfortably, then God bless you.
There are better and more practical options.
Dave Brigantino
Hollister
