Agriculture –
Agriculture is the focus of numerous initiatives designed to limit landowners’ rights to manage their private property for what they deem to be its highest and best use.
KNRC regularly monitors federal proposals and alerts its members when it determines that an initiative may have the potential to impact rights of landowners to engage in productive agricultural activities.
KNRC is currently monitoring in-perpetuity conservation easements, the US Fish and Wildlife Service’s (USFWS) endangered species proposals, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Army Corp of Engineers’ (USACE) Waters of the United States (WOTUS) rule, the National Park Service (NPS) national historic sites and trails designations, Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) rule and the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) revision and consolidation of the Kansas Resource Management Plan with those of Oklahoma, Texas and one county in Nebraska.
Each initiative carries the potential to restrict private property rights and erode the local tax base, which will harm local economies, risk jobs and shift tax burden unfairly.