Marion County residents have been celebrating all month long, thankful for the ground beneath them.
In 2007, county commissioners officially declared April as Marion County Farmland Preservation Month. For Sara Fennessy, the executive director of Horse Farms Forever, the awareness lasts all year.
“It’s reassuring to see that the county recognizes the importance of the industry,” Fennessy said. “It recognizes the importance of our farms, and we’re able to shine a bright spotlight on all of those people.”
Horse Farms Forever is focused on protecting farmland in Marion County, working with the county to strengthen the boundaries of the farmland preservation area, Fennessy said.
The farmland preservation area is a zoning designation serving as a buffer between urban growth and the protected farmland.
“It’s in this urban growth boundary where we can have the infrastructure and the resources to support that growth,” Marion County Commissioner Matt McClain said.
Save Our Rural Areas also fights to keep development in the county within the urban growth boundary. Tim Gant, the group’s president, got involved when his home was threatened by the development of a subdivision.
“Our goal is not necessarily to stop off growth but to try and keep it within the urban landscape where there’s infrastructure in place to support that kind of development,” Gant said. “Rather than this leapfrog development where they buy a few farms and then develop it and create havoc.”
Jerome Feaster, vice president of Save Our Rural Areas, noted that new developments can put a strain on the community.
“Sometimes what they’re wanting to do might be OK if it’s in the urban growth boundary,” Feaster said. “But even when it’s there, it still affects people in the rural areas because of the roads, and the traffic and the schools.”
Ellie Trueman, the president and founder of the Ocala Horse Alliance, said development has negatively impacted the county.
“It’s not just the loss of rural land; it’s the development of our land too, like, overdevelopment,” Trueman said. “Our infrastructure is hurting; our roads aren’t sufficient and our schools are crowded.”
Horse Farms Forever acts as a self-described “watchdog” of Marion County and works to monitor any proposed developments that could potentially negatively impact the farmland preservation area, Fennessy said.
“The farmland preservation area has been helpful in helping mitigate growth, but with that being said, the farmland preservation area is only as strong as our comprehensive plan and is only as strong as the votes of our five commissioners,” Fennessy said. “Fortunately, the county has done a really good job, and we have been working in an effort with the county as we’ve continued to grow.”
The comprehensive plan was established as a guide for development in Marion County to ensure strategic growth while preserving important farmland in the county, McClain said.
“This conversation sometimes gets framed as a mutually exclusive thing where it’s either growth or no growth or growth versus preserving natural resources and farmland,” McClain said. “I don’t think it has to be one or the other; you can do both if it’s done in the right way.”
Feaster said his biggest fear is seeing Ocala turn into Orlando.
“Our organization has gotten bigger, and we’ve opposed different county rezoning applications and have had success,” Feaster said. “Each time we’ve been involved, we’ve gathered up more people than our group, so our group has grown from just a handful of people.”
Save Our Rural Areas started the Marion County Farmland Preservation Festival to help advocate for farmland protection and for their motto to “keep the country country,” Gant said.
But the festival, which took place this year on April 13, also serves as an opportunity for education and celebration.
“We’re celebrating the fact of Marion County being the horse capital, so we have a festival. It’s just loads of fun,” Gant said. “Lots of families bring their kids; we have various vendors, food trucks and varying events.”
Trueman emphasized the importance of education that the annual festival provides.
“Education and awareness. I think that’s the main purpose of this festival, to get people thinking about how important it is to maintain rural space,” Trueman said. “You know, residents come in, they come from some of the big developments and so forth, and they all begin to appreciate what the rural land gives you.”
Cynthia Johnson, a Marion County resident who had a booth at the festival, uses the event as an opportunity to inspire people to start planting.
“It gives us an opportunity to come out and share our thoughts and our products; a lot of these people are growing in their backyards, and we’re building things farm and garden-related,” Johnson said. “Anybody that’s growing plants, any of these plant people, they’re trying to preserve it.”
Brion Kenyon has lived in Marion County since 1965 and said protection starts with awareness, and that’s why having the festival every year is so important.
“Unless you know the origin, it’s hard to know how you can protect where it came from if you don’t even understand or care about it,” Kenyon said. “This is to make people aware.”
It is all the things that make Marion County unique that are so important to protect, Fennessy said.
“We have some of the best and most serious equine athletes, riders and competitors in the world who are all here, and we are all here for the beautiful rural land and the quiet area,” Fennessy said. “So, it’s just really special to have Marion County recognized this month as Farmland Preservation Month because, again, it is our most noteworthy asset here in Ocala, and otherwise, we would just be another stop on the highway.”