Council Sets Public Hearing About Renting Excess Fisher Farm Field

Just a week after the Avon Town Council approved the Fisher Farm lease, the council set a public hearing for a second lease that would allow another farmer to grow crops on unneeded Fisher Farm land. 

Through a request for proposal process, the town chose Dan Logue as the desired lessee. 

The other lease with Roger and Isabelle Phillips covers 160 acres of land in Avon, including 47 "tillable" acres where crops can be grown, Town Council Chairman Mark Zacchio wrote in an email to Patch.

But there are also 153 acres, including about 123 tillable acres on the other side of Tillotson Road, previously used for cornfields, that the Phillips said they didn't need, town officials said. So the town decided to offer the land for lease to a different farmer. 

"Phillips was not prepared as a start up to handle all of the acreage, so we went to RFP for a farmer to rent the surplus property for crops," Zacchio said.

Both the Phillips and Logues leases are for three years. 

Robertson said that the prospective farmer would pay the town about $25,000 over three years to rent the property.  He said that the "farmer would be responsible for the entire parcel" but that "the lease fee would be based on the tillable acreage."

"There is no building involved - so it is not like a landlord/tenant relationship," Robertson said, adding that the proposed tenant would be the town's "lessee."

The council set the public hearing for its next regular meeting on Dec. 12 at 7 p.m., seeking input from residents about the lease, he said.