Farm Bill Could Aid Preservation
By Deborah Fitts
May 2002, WASHINGTON, D.C.

A federal program to protect farmland appears on track to become a significant source of new funding for battlefield preservation.

The Farmland Protection Program (FPP), which purchases development rights on prime farmland, is expanding its criteria to include the preservation of "historic or archaeological resources."

The Civil War Preservation Trust (CWPT) believes that the change will result in "a major new opportunity to preserve endangered Civil War battlefields."

At presstime in April, House and Senate conferees were debating the funding level for the Farm Bill, which includes FPP.

The Farmland Protection Program was created in 1996. Congress has appropriated a total of $52 million since then, which has helped to preserve 127,000 acres in 29 states.

Now not only will the program be available for battlefield farmland, said CWPT spokesman Jim Campi, but the funding level appears about to soar. He predicted an annual total “well above” $50 million.

"This would really be a boon," Campi said. "You're going from a program that's starved for money to a program that's going to have a ton of money."

Campi explained that the provision attaching historic preservation to the FPP was recently inserted by a member of Congress from the West who wanted to protect Indian resources. The expanded bill would appear ideal for battlefield preservation, said Campi, since so many remaining battlefields are actively farmed. At places like Antietam battlefield, park officials are keen to have real corn growing in the Cornfield as a way to help evoke the wartime appearance.

The bill also calls for protection of productive farmland with access to markets. Campi pointed out that many battles were fought along major transportation arteries of their day — a situation that typically still prevails nearly a century and a half later. In fact, he said, it is in many cases those very roads that attract the develop that threatens battlefields.

Campi noted that CWPT worked with the American Farmland Trust, the Trust for Public Land and the Land Trust Alliance to encourage passage of the new federal legislation.

Now, he said, CWPT was "looking for a few high-priority battlefields where this money can be used, so we'll have some proven successes." FPP provides funds on a matching basis; the program will pay no more than 50 percent of the cost of the easements.

FPP will join two other major federal sources of money for battlefield preservation: the TEA-21 transportation enhancement program and the Land & Water Conservation Fund (LWCF).

CWPT was instrumental in getting Congress to allocate $11 million from LWCF for purchase of non-federal battlefield acreage. The money was signed into law in October and should be available this spring, Campi said.

The Farmland Protection Program is administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Natural Resources Conservation Service, which works with state, local and tribal governments to buy conservation easements from willing sellers. The program requires involvement by a state or local farmland protection program.