Brentwood, California

Background

Brentwood, California, population 51,481 (2010) lies 30 miles east of Oakland, California in Contra Costa County. Brentwood is known for its orchards and farms, many of which offer “pick-your-own” opportunities for Bay Area residents. The City wants to preserve this agricultural heritage by protecting farmland and strengthening the viability of the agricultural industry. To this end, Brentwood adopted agricultural land mitigation requirements which require developers to deed restrict one acre of farmland for each acre of farmland converted to development. Alternatively, the city allows developers to comply with the mitigation requirement by paying an in-lieu fee for each acre of farmland proposed for development. Finally, the city also adopted a TDR program to encourage the preservation of farmland as described below.

Process

In Brentwood’s Transfer of Agricultural Credits or TAC program, sending sites must be at least one acre in size. Two transferable agricultural credits are issued for each acre of eligible land placed under a permanent conservation easement.

Brentwood’s Agricultural land conservation provisions, Chapter 17.730, contain notable details regarding agricultural conservation easements. As of amendments adopted in 2010, Section 17.730.060 D reads” If a court of law finds that the public interests described in this chapter can no longer reasonably be fulfilled as to an interest acquired, the interest in the agricultural mitigation land may be extinguished through sale, and the proceeds shall be redeposited into the city’s mitigation fund account, and be used to continue agricultural preservation programs as approved by the city and provided in this chapter.”

Agricultural credits may be transferred to any residential zone in the City via a development agreement. The maximum density allowed on the receiving site upon transfer is the maximum density permitted on that site by the general plan.

Status

In March 2004, Associate Planner Erik Nolthenius explained that the City was processing its first TAC application. The project involves the subdivision of 31 acres of land into 84 single-family lots. The developer proposed 26 lots in excess of the General Plan mid-range density for this property. The developer offered to place an agricultural easement on 10 acres of land. At the allocation rate of two TACs per acre of preserved farmland, this easement would account for 20 of the 26 additional lots requested.

In 2010, the city adopted an agricultural preservation program implementation plan and amended Chapter 17.730 Agricultural Preservation Program of the city’s municipal codes accordingly.

In 2017, the Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust merged with the Central Valley Farmland Trust to form the California Farmland Trust.