Gov. M. Jodi Rell has announced that $5 million, which will allow the state to add hundreds of acres of working farmland to ongoing preservation efforts, is expected to be approved when the state Bond Commission meets March 16.
Today, she will be at the 62-acre Bomba Farm, a former dairy operation, in Seymour where owners are in the process of selling its development rights to the state for $865,000 or $13,956 an acre, according to information supplied by the governor’s office.
It is one of eight farms preserved in New Haven County and the first in the Town of Seymour. The farm currently raises beef cattle and hogs. Owned by siblings, Edward, Eugene and Anne Bomba, the farm has been a family operation since the early 1900s. The farm grows hay, flowers, herbs and a variety of vegetables including corn and gourds, according to information supplied by the governor’s office.
Connecticut has the second oldest farmland preservation program in the country, preserving development rights of its first farm in 1979. Rell said the state’s goal is to preserve 130,000 acres of farmland with 85,000 acres dedicated to growing crops. To date, about 268 farms totaling 35,518 acres have been preserved or approved for preservation.
“The farmland preservation program offers families, such as the Bombas, an opportunity to preserve their legacy as well as their land,” Rell said in a press release. “The lure of development has been all too keen over the past several decades especially for farmers struggling with high production costs. Sadly, that the trade-off has turned pastures into parking lots. That will not happen under this program.”
