After receiving overwhelming criticism and legal scrutiny of its proposed soil disturbance regulations, the State Agriculture Development Committee (SADC) has substantially revised its proposed rules. The revised proposal has been published in the New Jersey Register here. The public comment period is now open, and interested persons may submit public comments up until the deadline of September 13, 2024. For those new to this topic, these limits apply only to preserved farmland.

Earlier in the year, the SADC announced its intent to substantially change the rules and provided an overview of the anticipated changes. In the substantially revised, current proposal, a limit on soil disturbance is still proposed. However, under the new proposal, pre-existing soil disturbance will not be counted towards those limits. The SADC’s position is that the proposed cap on new disturbance balances the right to agricultural development with the requirement of soil conservation. This parallel’s the Supreme Court’s decision in the Quaker Valley Farms case which cautioned the SADC that farmers needed to be more clearly guided on the limits of permissible soil disturbance. The Supreme Court held that there is a point when enough prime quality soil is destroyed that a farmer should reasonably know it violates the farmland preservation easement. The Supreme Court’s holding was narrow, and the preservation easement in question was, in my opinion, distinguishable in critical respects from the majority of preservation easements in New Jersey. Nonetheless, conflicting easements terms for agricultural development versus soil conservation remained a larger issue. The SADC aims to resolve that issue with its newly proposed rules.

It remains important to carefully review the rule proposal. I will be reviewing the rules and conferring with my interested agricultural clients to determine what comments will be submitted.

Again, as per the published notice, written comments may be submitted by mail until September 13, 2024, to:

Charles Roohr, Deputy Executive Director

State Agriculture Development Committee

P.O. Box 330

Trenton, New Jersey 08625-0330

Or electronically to: SADC@ag.nj.gov.

THE INFORMATION CONTAINED HEREIN IS GENERAL INFORMATION, IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE, AND DOES NOT CREATE AN ATTORNEY-CLIENT RELATIONSHIP. YOUR SPECIFIC FACTS AND CIRCUMSTANCES MUST BE CAREFULLY REVIEWED WITH A RETAINED ATTORNEY PRIOR TO REACHING LEGAL CONCLUSIONS.

You may contact Nicole at (908)801-5434 or info@nlvlegal.com. For more information, visit www.voigtlawoffice.com.