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<br />2001Comprehensive Plan <br />Amended February 26, 2002 <br /> <br />b) Conservation Easements <br />Conservation easements are the voluntary transfer of specified development and <br />land use rightsfrorn a landowner to a qualifying organization such as a public <br />body or non-profit agency. Conservation easements can be in the form of <br />permanent easements (lasting forever) or "term" easements (lasting for a period of <br />time at which the land use may be changed). Conservation easements in Ramsey <br />should be used to protect natural resources or to permanently preserve areas of the <br />greenway corridor. <br /> <br />c) Transfer of Development Rights <br />Transfer of development rights allows landowners who may wish to preserve their <br />lands to still receive a profit from the sale of development rights. The purchaser <br />ofthe development rights would then be able to develop at greater densities. This <br />technique requires the community to establish (on a community wide basis) <br />sending zones, which are areas the community wishes to preserve and receiving <br />zones, which are areas that are most easily served by utilities and are the most <br />logical growth expansion areas. Examples of sending zones may include lands <br />within the greenway corridor, lands identified as containing significant natural <br />resources or lands within the Mississippi River Critical Area corridor. Receiving <br />zones may be located where utilities are readily available or could be easily <br />extended or possibly within the existing MUSA area. <br /> <br />d) Purchase of Development Rights <br />Purchase of development rights (PDR) operates basically the same way as in the <br />TDR program except instead of transferring development rights the development <br />rights are basically retired or lost. Development rights are typically purchased by <br />the government or non-profit organizations and the land is put into a permanent <br />conservation easement. This program is more of a tool to reduce total growth and <br />can potentially lead to sprawl or leap frog development when areas adjacent to <br />urban services loose their development rights. This program should be used <br />carefully. Residential lands within the Mississippi River Critical Area may be <br />good candidates for the PDR program. <br /> <br />e) Preferential Taxation <br />Preferential taxation can be used to protect wetlands, agricultural lands or open <br />space. Several of these programs currently exist such as the Agricultural <br />Preserves and Green Acres program, which provide tax breaks for agricultural <br />uses and the Wetland Tax Exemption program which exempts wetland areas from <br />property tax assessments. The purpose for preferential taxation programs is to <br />level the playing field by acknowledging the 'and's actual-use rather than a market <br />value based approach on uses to which the landowner has no intention of putting <br />the land. <br /> <br />f) Property Acquisition <br />Property acquisition is probably the simplest form of open space preservation to <br />understand in that it simply means the public buys the land. This technique gives <br />the public control over the use of the property; however, this technique can be <br />very expensive and may not always enjoy strong public support. <br /> <br />2001 Ramsey Comprehensive Plan <br />Amended February 26, 2002 <br /> <br />Page XlII-9 <br />