Op-Ed: Agriculture's Place in New York's Constitutional Foundations

The issue of government overreach has been important to me long before I became a candidate for Putnam County Legislature. In fact, my family goes back five decades fighting for civil liberties all the way to the United States Supreme Court.

That is why when I became aware of the situation regarding Ridge Ranch, and the state of Agriculture overall here in Putnam County, I became a loud advocate and immersed myself in all available information to ensure not only proper advocacy, but also, to educate my neighbors who may not be aware of whats going on, and how it may not stop with farmers.

That’s why I always solicit as much information as I can from all sources, regardless of politics. If I don’t know, I will say I don’t know and then I will find someone who does.

Agriculture, the Agriculture District, and Land Use policy can be a very confusing topic, and can be difficult to understand as to its importance to all Putnam County residents.

This week, Cassandra Roth, founder of Hen’s Tooth Consulting, Communications Director for Ridge Ranch, and Strategic Advisor to the For The People Party, shares her expertise.

At a time when information is too often divided along party lines, leaving the public underinformed and polarized, her work focuses on cutting through the noise. Her role with the For The People Party reflects that mission: moving beyond politics to reunite individuals around shared facts and restore informed civic engagement.

She comes to us fresh off serving as the lead researcher behind a resounding victory for Ridge Ranch over Putnam County in New York’s Supreme Court.

New York State made a binding constitutional promise to protect agriculture. In 1894, voters ratified a State Constitution that prioritized the conservation of natural resources. By 1969, that commitment expanded to recognize farmland as equally vital. An amendment to Article XIV, Section 4 of the NYS Constitution declared:

"The policy of the state shall be to conserve and protect its natural resources and scenic beauty and encourage the development and improvement of its agricultural lands for the production of food and other agricultural products."

This is not an aspirational goal; it became law. Agricultural lands were recognized not merely as private property, but as public assets essential to New York’s economy, food security, environmental health, and cultural heritage.

Yet in 2025, we stand in a county where that constitutional promise has been hollowed out almost beyond recognition. In Putnam County today, the landscape tells the story more plainly than any statute book could. Storage facilities rise where hay fields once stood. Pastures have been replaced by parking lots, warehouses, and condo developments. New generations of farmers find it nearly impossible to start or sustain operations here.

This did not happen overnight, nor did it happen by accident. It happened because, over time, the programs designed to protect farmland were misunderstood, misapplied, and, in some cases, opposed by those who never fully accepted what the Constitution demands.

The purpose of Agricultural Districts was to shield agriculture from local political pressures, not to reflect them. The program itself was established to fulfill a constitutional mandate: to preserve farmland, promote its improvement, and prevent it from being squeezed out by suburban and commercial expansion.

Yet over the years, erosion set in. Town boards, planning departments, supervisors, and zoning officials quietly and surreptitiously inserted themselves into the Agricultural District inclusion process and program far beyond what state law permits. Conversations about farmland drifted from the core constitutional protections to local land use preferences, often shaped by the machinery of politics more than the morality of leadership.

By adopting an Agricultural District, a county affirms its constitutional responsibility to protect agriculture. The obligation to safeguard viable farmland from unreasonable local interference is not created by the district; it already exists under the New York State Constitution.

Establishing a district is a formal commitment to carry out that duty through the statutory framework provided by law. Putnam County, which did not establish its Agricultural District until 2003, remains the most recent county to join a program that most of New York embraced decades earlier. To see how far the original intent and legal standards have drifted in such a brief period of time is particularly troubling.

The function and purpose of technical support agencies such as Soil and Water Conservation Districts have quickly become misunderstood or misused, becoming de facto regulators rather than voluntary partners. Farmer-majority boards, created to safeguard agricultural interests, were treated as advisory afterthoughts. Public hearings, intended as opportunities for open comment following an objective technical and legislative review, devolved into battlegrounds where political opinion often overpowered constitutional principle.

In Putnam County, opposition to Agricultural District applicants has sometimes emerged before the enrollment period even officially begins. quiet lobbying, unofficial pressure, and early political resistance compromise the program intent and process before technical review or public comment can proceed fairly. Whether intentional or unintentional, the result is the same: the facts are tainted by politics long before a hearing is held or a vote is cast.

The erosion of these protections is not about assigning personal blame. It did not happen because of one individual or one isolated decision. It happened through years of misunderstanding, misapplication, and, at times, deliberate resistance. There are certainly some who appear to have guided this drift intentionally over the years. But what matters now is not retrospective blame. It is how we choose to respond moving forward.

Those willing to acknowledge the constitutional foundation of Agricultural Districts, confront the realities of past and ongoing missteps, and commit to restoring the program's integrity will show through their actions who is prepared for fair, lawful, and accountable governance. Those who continue to obscure, resist, or distort the truth will reveal themselves just as clearly. No accusations are needed. The work ahead will separate those who value constitutional responsibility from those who have clung to political convenience at the expense of the agricultural community.

A system that drifts inevitably becomes a system that corrupts. When constitutional protections are misunderstood, misapplied, or treated as optional, power fills the vacuum. Putnam County did not simply lose farms; it lost control over the meaning of farming itself and who decides its future. That is how a slow erosion of understanding becomes a slow form of corruption: not the corruption of headlines or scandals, but the steady, systemic redefinition of public purpose.

This matters. Farming is not simply a nostalgic symbol of a different era. It is still one of the few land uses that contributes more to the local tax base than it costs in public services. This is not theory; it is fact, demonstrated time and again through fiscal studies across New York State and nationally. Agricultural land consistently generates more in property taxes than it consumes in public services like schools, emergency response, and infrastructure maintenance.

Commercial development can bring important economic vitality, but it often carries higher associated service demands. Residential development almost always costs more to service than it generates in revenue, increasing the burden on existing taxpayers. In contrast, farmland quietly subsidizes local budgets, preserving open space and supporting environmental health without draining public finances. This is not an argument against growth.

Healthy counties need a balanced mix of residential, commercial, and agricultural land uses. Supporting farms remains one of the simplest and most cost-effective ways to preserve open space and stabilize local tax structures.

Agricultural District protections support farmers at no additional cost to taxpayers. It simply requires honoring the constitutional promise already made and giving working farmers a fair chance to survive and thrive on the land they steward, supported by a state-backed program designed to protect them.

At the same time, the State continues to invest heavily in open space preservation through grants and land trust acquisitions. These efforts have value, and land trusts and conservation programs play an important role. However, farmers are too often left behind in that process.

It is fair to ask why we are willing to invest millions of public dollars to remove land from the local tax base through acquisitions, yet remain reluctant to make the far simpler commitment of supporting the farmers who already protect that land and strengthen their communities every day.

If the goal is truly to preserve open space, rural character, and economic stability, supporting working farms remains the most direct, affordable, and sustainable path forward. When farmland is preserved, everyone benefits economically, environmentally, and socially. When it is lost, the community pays; both immediately and for generations to come.

Understanding the difference between Agricultural Districts and Agricultural Assessments is critical. Agricultural Districts, created under the Agriculture and Markets Law, are about land use rights, not tax relief. They protect farming operations from unreasonable local interference. Being part of an Agricultural District does not automatically lower property taxes. It provides a crucial legal shield against the regulatory and political pressures that often push agriculture aside.

Agricultural Assessments, by contrast, are a separate financial tool under Real Property Tax Law. They enable eligible farmland to be valued for its agricultural use instead of speculative market forces, delivering meaningful relief to farmers but serving a distinct and complementary purpose.

Agricultural Districts matter because they give farmers access to state-level enforcement. If local governments violate protections, farmers in a District are not left to fight alone; they have the backing of the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets. Without that shield, the constitutional right to farm would be far more vulnerable, and far more expensive, to defend.

What is needed is a full rebuild: a return to constitutional literacy, a restoration of technical expertise and farmer-led boards, and a recommitment to the principle that agriculture is a public good, not a discretionary aesthetic preference.

This will not be easy. It may require reclaiming authority from those who have misused it. But it is necessary. Because the alternative, the continued loss of farmland, the continued hollowing out of rural economies, and the continued erosion of local food systems will cost us far more in the long run. And no number of storage units, parking lots, or warehouses will replace what has been lost.

The generations who wrote and amended the New York State Constitution understood the risks. They saw the pressures that would come: development, convenience, and short-term thinking. They did not wait until it was too late. They acted to prevent the damage.

The constitutional foundation they built still stands. It has not been repealed. It has only been neglected. The question is not whether those protections endure. They do. The real question is whether we will honor them willingly or be forced to confront the cost of neglect.

They wait for those with the resolve to reclaim them.

Cassandra A. Roth; Founder of Hen’s Tooth Consulting, with a background in regulatory and governmental affairs and a focus on constitutional rights, governance challenges, and strategic consulting for individuals, organizations, and public bodies.

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