Limits Urged on Williamson Act Tax Breaks : Agriculture: Planning director wants farming program abusers kicked out, but says broader enforcement would be too costly and harmful to conservation.

Ventura County’s top planner has recommended a limited crackdown on landowners who do not qualify for tax breaks under a farmland conservation law, but rejected a broader enforcement effort as too costly and potentially harmful to county goals of preserving open space.

County Planning Director Keith Turner, who last month estimated undeserved local tax breaks at between several hundred thousand dollars and $1 million a year, reported Wednesday that the amount gained by a full-scale crackdown is impossible to gauge--but is far less than he first thought.

A wholesale crackdown “appears to be counterproductive” since it might force some marginal farmlands out of the conservation program and encourage construction on them, Turner said in a report to the Board of Supervisors for next Tuesday’s meeting.

And it would “not produce additional proper tax revenues for the county general fund in amounts sufficient to justify compromising land-use protection,” he reported.

However, a Ventura County Farm Bureau official said Wednesday that the county should strictly enforce its guidelines that require landowners to run legitimate farming or ranch operations to receive tax benefits from the farmland preservation program.

Abuses sully the image of true farmers, said Rex Laird, executive director of the farm bureau.

“Having a revenue-producing program shouldn’t be No. 1,” Laird said. “The credibility of the Williamson Act has to be No. 1. It’s the law. Why isn’t it enforced?”

Under the preservation program, farmers and ranchers receive tax breaks in exchange for agreeing to keep their land in agriculture for at least 10 more years.

A potential crackdown is being considered by the Board of Supervisors because a recent Planning Department survey showed that owners of thousands of local acres enrolled in the 1965 farmland conservation program receive tax breaks for which they may not qualify.

The Times reported last month that a Hollywood star, an English lord, a television production company, a former U.S. ambassador and a gravel pit operator were among the landlords that apparently receive undeserved tax breaks--some worth thousands of dollars a year.

Several of the questionable properties are in Hidden Valley west of Thousand Oaks in one of the nation’s richest communities. Some parcels are either too small to qualify as legitimate livestock operations, or the owners do not care for enough animals to meet minimum county requirements.

For landowners to qualify under the California Land Conservation Act of 1965, the so-called Williamson Act, the county sets minimum acreage standards of 80 acres for grazing land, 40 acres for livestock operations and 10 acres for irrigated crops.

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About one-fourth of all privately owned land in the county, or 151,000 acres, is enrolled in the program.

Currently, the county does not force unqualified landowners out of the program, although officials sometimes ask owners to leave voluntarily when they obviously are not involved in agriculture.

In his report, Turner recommends that the Board of Supervisors put some teeth into current practices.

Turner said in an interview that a limited enforcement program--which would require no new county employees--could still identify landowners whose properties are “obviously out of the spirit” of the county Williamson Act guidelines.

Under Turner’s recommendations, property owners who do not qualify as legitimate farmers or ranchers could be targeted when violations are obvious, through citizen complaints or during questioning when owners apply for special permits to alter their properties.

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For example, Turner said owners of select Hidden Valley estates that have little or no agricultural uses might be forced out of the program. Even without a formal enforcement program, county officials said they recently persuaded a British industrialist not to renew his livestock contract after he acknowledged while applying for a construction permit that he had no horses on his 27-acre Potrero Road estate.

But Turner said he is opposed to evaluating all 975 Williamson Act contracts for violations partly because of the costs of hiring one or two new employees and partly because a broad crackdown might speed up development in open space areas.

While $3.65 million annually is lost in local property tax because of Williamson Act tax breaks, only a fraction of that amount could be regained by cracking down on abusers of the program, Turner said.

And the county’s general fund--which would pay for beefed-up enforcement--would get just 18% of the recaptured taxes, he said. The rest would go to schools (56%), special districts (19%) and cities (7%), he said.

In addition, the county general fund would lose part of its state subsidy for the Williamson Act program each time it threw out a violator, Turner said.

If the entire Williamson Act program were eliminated in this county--and not just abusers thrown out--the county general fund’s 18% share of recaptured taxes would be $657,360, Turner said.

But once lost state subsidies are considered, he said, the net gain would be only $372,000--and even that would be gained incrementally during a phase-out period over the next nine years.

The biggest problem with a broad crackdown, however, may be its potential impact on development in open space areas, especially those such as Hidden Valley that are next to emerging new subdivisions, Turner said.

“In Hidden Valley, we’re going to have to look at the potential westward expansion of the Lake Sherwood community,” Turner said. “There are people attempting to do that.”

Zoning in most of Hidden Valley allows only one dwelling per 40 acres and the county general plan allows one house per 20 acres, he noted. But those plans can be changed to more dense developments by a vote of the Board of Supervisors.

“So I guess I’m not satisfied--at least from a long-term perspective--in relying just on the general plan and zoning,” Turner said. “That’s why we’ve got a Williamson Act program here.”

In fact, the Planning Department is also recommending that county guidelines be changed to consider the value of preserving open space--not just farmland--when considering Williamson Act contracts, according to Turner’s report.

County guidelines, reflecting the state law, included open space provisions until 1984, when local farmers successfully recommended that the regulations be tightened.

But those stricter guidelines have not been enforced because of a lack of staff time and money.

Still, interest in a crackdown was peaked by a Planning Department survey last summer, which showed widespread noncompliance and indicated that stronger enforcement might pay for itself.

The survey of 18,680 acres in the program found that 6,300 acres did not qualify for the property tax breaks, mostly because the parcels were too small to be viable ranches and farms.