Schuylkill County Commissioners George Halcovage Jr. and Barron “Boots” Hetherington argued last week about adding $200,000 for the county’s farmland preservation efforts.

Halcovage voted no and Hetherington and Commissioner Gary Hess voted yes. The addition of the money brings the total 2022 funding to $262,923. Of that, $12,932 was from rollback taxes where someone violated rules necessitating a penalty.

With the extra funds, about $600,000 from the state is possible because the state matches up to $4 for each dollar allocated by the county. Hetherington said five or six farms could be preserved.

“This is not about personal gain. This is about protecting farmland,” Hetherington said to Halcovage, who said the commissioner was 13th on the list of farms to preserve.

Halcovage said Hetherington, before he was commissioner, asked the county to reinstate $50,000 for farmland preservation, something Halcovage did willingly.

“You have mentioned that your farm, a portion of the farm, is under the farmland preservation and that the rest of your farm is 13th on the list and with current funding we weren’t going to reach your farm and the other farms that were on the list. And that concerned me. I know that initially you had said can we use American Recovery Plan funds for this, which the answer was no. Now we are going to take $200,000 out of contingency in order to fund this.”

Halcovage said, “This is your pet project and that you want my support for that. But on the other hand you feel that my pet support is broadband initiative and with our discussions on the American Recovery Plan that number has been decreased as far as your view of it. My view is that with the ARPA funds that broadband is a major initiative bringing unserved and underserved areas.”

He said farmers could benefit from the broadband effort because of farming technology.

“Right now, we need to move on broadband initiatives because of students, because of telemedicine, because of economic development. It has become a core function.”

He said “thousands of people” would benefit from broadband.

Hetherington said he was “mixing apples and oranges” and said money isn’t out of ARP.

“Anytime you want to sit down and talk about the broadband project I’m willing to talk about that,” he said.

He said preserving farmland benefits all.

“It’s a winner for everybody involved whether it’s the school district, municipality or the county,” Hetherington said, confirming his farm is on the list.

Hetherington said the list of farmers for preservation grows annually.

Halcovage said Hetherington had farmland preservation on the list for possible ARP funding.

“You’re trying to mix something together to make me look bad here. I resent that accusation, sir,” Hetherington said.

Commissioner Gary Hess said both men had good points. He said farming is the number one industry in the county. Preserving it is important. However, broadband access helps farmers because equipment runs on GIS and other applications.

Brittany Moore, county farmland coordinator, said 76 applicants meet the qualifications for preserving farmland.

“Our mission is to preserve farms with quality soil to protect the food security of the country and the commonwealth,” Moore said.

She said the there is more work to accomplish.

“We would really appreciate the bump in funding to get more farms every year to accomplish our goal,” she said.