A lane lined with red maple trees winds past a 250-year-old stone farmhouse, a chicken coop and a barn nearly as old as the home. Morgan horses graze in the lush pastures and slurp water from clear ponds, helping to complete an idyllic South Carroll County scene that has been safeguarded from development through a preservation easement.
From this homestead, Carol Hackney, 74 and a lifelong farmer, bristles at the sight of surveyors' flags and stakes.
She said she has tried unsuccessfully over the years to buy the neighboring land. But instead of green fields, the view from her windows soon will be grandiose Colonials with three-car garages.
"They will be mowing and carving up land for roads. It is an awful worry, and it could be devastating to my home," she said. "It would be a terrible shame for this development to go through."
Farms are increasingly rare in Eldersburg, Carroll County's most populated, fast-growth area. Barely a mile from the traffic on Liberty Road, Hackney's Cold Saturday Farm stands as a green oasis in an area covered in macadam and crowded with strip malls, sprawling subdivisions and big-box stores.
Hackney's 10-acre farm and the surrounding land slope gradually to clumps of towering trees that buffer Liberty Reservoir, the drinking water supply for nearly 2 million people in the Baltimore metropolitan area. Hackney frets over the potential effect of development, with its wells, septic systems and storm water runoff, on the reservoir.
When Hackney bought the 10-acre farm in 1976 she knew that surrounding land could be developed. But she has permanently preserved her property through the Carroll County Land Trust, a nonprofit organization that works to safeguard agricultural land from development. The trust offers financial incentives in the form of tax credits of up to $50 an acre for up to 15 years for development easements donated in perpetuity.
Ronald L. Fradkin, who owns the 38 acres that nearly encircle Hackney's land -- years ago, the two properties were a single farm -- is set to develop the land into a subdivision for luxury homes. He said he has a sales contract with a homebuilder but would not divulge the price.
Fradkin said he was not aware that Hackney had placed her farm in preservation, and he doesn't recall negotiating with Hackney about selling his land. He added that no one ever approached him about placing it in preservation.
"I would have considered it years ago," he said. "It makes sense."
But now, with a lucrative offer for the land on the table, the time for considering is past, he said. If the county wants more open space and more preserved farmland, it should be willing to pay for it, Fradkin said.
"They changed my zoning because I don't farm this land, and my taxes soared," he said. "If they want open space, that is not how to get it. They almost forced me to develop."
Richard A. Owings, director of the county bureau of development review, said his staff has recommended approval of the new subdivision on Fradkin's land, to be called Derby Farm. Fradkin won preliminary approval for his proposed development from several county agencies about 13 years ago, before many stricter conservation measures were enacted. Fradkin said he is determined to move forward to the Planning Commission, the next step in the process, in part because many of the original waivers and approvals will expire by July 2004.
Preservation is a far greater incentive to Hackney than any financial offer, she said. She continues to manage the farm's daily operations -- she owns four horses and boards others. She rents living quarters to a young couple who help with chores in their spare time.
Creating buffers
Every time she hears a truck or a chain saw in the distance, she cringes.
"I can't stop development around me, but I have protected this farm to the utmost of my ability," she said. "God made this place, and I just try to keep it."
The situation shows the importance of creating buffers between preserved land and encroaching development, said Bill Powel, Carroll's preservation program manager. The state and several counties are considering making stronger efforts to ensure that preserved land has adequate buffers, perhaps by approaching neighboring property owners, Powel said. But, he added, no jurisdiction has moved forward with the concept.
"It is unfortunate that easements have not been used to prevent development on neighboring properties," said. "Ms. Hackney has an unusually small property, but it is contiguous to the reservoir and that makes it an asset to preservation."
He said owners of property near land that has been preserved should be willing to consider easement buffers because they could benefit from their neighbors' decisions. Adjoining land that can never be developed will make the new building lots more attractive to buyers, Powel said.
"This developer will probably get more for the houses he builds because he can say the land around the development is permanently preserved," Powel said.
'Connect the dots'
Owings, the development review director, said he senses more pressure to "connect the dots, to preserve contiguous land."
"But I doubt that would happen in this case, not when the land has become so valuable for development," he added.
Hackney knows about losing battles. She named her property Cold Saturday after a farm her parents owned in Finksburg. The elder Hackneys lost all but 75 acres of that farm in a prolonged dispute with Baltimore, which purchased the property to build Liberty Reservoir.
But she is determined to make every effort to keep development at bay. She has launched a letter-writing campaign trying to enlist the aid of the county, Baltimore City and conservation groups.
"I don't think I am going to stop this, but I am going to do everything I can to make it digestible," she said. "What I am fighting for is preservation."