Madonna's Tree Farm Tests The Limits

The queen of reinvention is at it again. And this time, the Material Girl went outside the world of entertainment and is now a … farmer.

After purchasing a parcel of land adjacent to her horse farm, Madonna went on to create a tree farm in Bridgehampton on what was once horse paddocks, much to the chagrin of neighbors and the press, who believe she is using the tree farm to secure privacy at her mansion.

The parcel at the corner of Mitchells Lane and Scuttle Hole Road was a bargain at a reported $2.2 million, as the development rights had already been purchased for $10 million by Southampton Town and Suffolk County.

“This tree farm is a joke,” said Geri Bauer, a septuagenarian who in the 1980s co-owned the 26-acre plot where Madonna now operates her equestrian Wild Ocean Farm. Ms. Bauer was one of the first landowners in the 1980s to transition protected food producing agricultural land to equestrian use, working closely with the county to come into compliance.

But whether Madonna is an actual farmer or not, Suffolk County’s program for purchasing development rights doesn’t see a difference between a tree farm for a celebrity and a potato farm for a resident.

Madonna's property can be used as a nursery because that use is considered agricultural" under New York State Agriculture and Markets Law, according to John v.H. Halsey, president of the Peconic Land Trust.

The definition of agriculture includes vineyards, nurseries, horticulture, food production and equestrian use, he said. "In other words, under New York Law, the Matt Lauer and Madonna parcels are considered to be in agricultural use."

Matt Lauer, co-anchor of “The Today Show,” was recently lambasted for his attempt to plant trees on the border of his Water Mill horse farm. Like Madonna’s Bridgehampton properties, the land had an agricultural easement placed on it when the town bought the development rights.

This definition of "agricultural" use has led to new horse farms on former potato fields whose development rights were sold, as well as the practice of wealthy individuals purchasing protected land that they then let lie fallow.

“We never imagined that people would be buying land just to have the farmland and have no intention of farming it,” said Tom Halsey, an 11th-generation local farmer who was on an agricultural committee that advised former Suffolk County Executive John V.N. Klein on how to protect East End farmland against residential development. The development rights purchase program was designed to help ease estate and federal tax burdens on farmers after Suffolk County saw a rapid decline in farmland in 10 years, from 75,000 acres in 1962 to 55,000 acres in 1972.

“Our land is worth so much more for building houses than it is for farming that we can’t possibly pay a tax based on what we earn farming,” said Tom Halsey. “We had no idea that horse farms or equestrian facilities would be determined to be agriculture.”

He admits though, that given the definition of agriculture in the eyes of New York State, “we should have known.”

“Today there is an additional push of people saying, we don’t even want to see horse farms, we don’t even want to see nurseries,” he said, adding that municipalities now can buy additional rights to ensure that preserved farmland is actually used to grow food.

In 2011, the Peconic Land Trust began designing additional easements that, if sold by a landowner to a municipality like the town or county, can assure that protected farmland will continue to be used specifically and actively for food production. In addition, the new “affirmative and affordable farming covenants and resale restrictions,” as they are called, dramatically reduce the value of already undevelopable land to a level that farmers can afford to purchase it to use for food production—to around $25,000 an acre versus around $100,00.

These additional easements have “more teeth” for enforcement, according to Adam Halsey, a local farmer who is the son of Tom Halsey as well as a member of the Agricultural Advisory Committee of the Community Preservation Fund.

“The town and the county were negligent,” said Ms. Bauer about the approval of Madonna’s tree farm. “The minute she bought [the first farm] she enclosed it with all those privet hedges.”

Unfortunately for Madonna’s neighbors, the definition of an open vista on protected agricultural land is subjective, no matter what the intent was. “Open space has different definitions. It is still considered open space if it has shrubs, plants or trees grown on it for agricultural production,” said Mary Wilson, who heads the Southampton Town Community Preservation Fund and was in attendance at the meeting when the county approved the proposition to change the land from horse paddocks to the tree nursery.

“Folks would say a scenic vista is important," Ms. Wilson continued. "But again, it is not that important that the county and the town exclude certain agricultural uses that may affect a scenic visa.”

In a perfect world, protected land would offer both scenic vistas and agricultural use, but some farmers say that the two can be mutually exclusive—things like deer fences, greenhouses, even shrubs obstruct views, but can be standard for many farmers.

“If it is preserved, that is a big step in good,” said Tom Halsey. “The people who ride by may not like what it is doing now, but just remember, it could all be mega-mansions.”

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