Block · one region of the page, as the scanner read it. It may hold a whole story, part of one, several, or an advertisement; stitching blocks into articles is the next step. Text is supplied OCR.
Page 11 · column 7 of 9 · from the scan, no model involved
Rollback Taxes Questionable
With general land use taxation, participants who withdraw from the program have to pay a rollback tax—the difference between use value taxation and fair market value taxation plus interest—when their land is changed to a non-qualifying use, Fletcher noted. “I think you’re going to have a problem getting that tax money back if land in an ag district is developed after eight years,” the Sperryville attorney warned.
In addition to preserving the beauty of Rappahannock, “farmland holds down everybody’s tax rate,” Fletcher maintained. “I think you’d want to preserve it at any cost.”
He argued that the only way to retain the county’s agricultural base is through giving “some kind of tax break to the people who are dumb enough...damn stupid, insane to stay in farming in Rappahannock...The land is beautiful but for farming, it’s terriblel It’s patheticl” he said. “I wish somebody had told me that!” interjected Wood, himself a farmer and orchard ist.
“You’ll destroy B. Settle if you don’t give him land use,” Fletcher continued. Then in place of Settle’s 150 acre farm, the county will have a subdivision with eight houses on 25 acre lots with 16 additional school children to educate, he predicted, resulting in a net loss for everyone, including the small lot owner.
“If you don’t do something to help the farmers, you’ll be destroying this county in the most rapid and effective
80.9%