New Kent farm VOF’s 700,000th easement

Virginia Outdoors Foundation (VOF) recently protected its 700,000th acre of open space thanks to a conservation easement donated on a 116-acre bicentennial farm in New Kent County.

Silver Hall Farm has been owned and operated by the Binns family since 1771. The farm sits across from Crawford’s State Forest, which was acquired by VOF in 1995 before transferring to the Virginia Department of Forestry.

Silver Hall Farm’s easement prohibits subdivisions and limits the amount of dwellings and other impervious surfaces that can be built on the farm. These restrictions will ensure that the soils (two-thirds of which are designated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as prime farmland) will remain available for farming, forestry, and other rural uses.

The easement also includes a half-mile riparian buffer on Schiminoe Creek that runs along the farm’s eastern edge.

“To me, this farm is a legacy from my predecessors,” said Edward Binns, who runs all of the farming operations. “It looks like development pressure is going to increase in the future, and I did not want to see it go under houses.”

The property is held in a trust managed by Binns, his sisters Margaret Binns Adamson and Grace Binns Timberlake, and his mother, Lora Mead Binns.

VOF has protected about 45,000 acres in the Richmond region using conservation easements.

To learn more about conservation easements and associated tax benefits, visit virginiaoutdoorsfoundation.org.