A soon to be proposed state bill aims to provide local trout farmers with property tax relief akin to other agricultural uses.

Currently, the state agricultural department mandates that farms of any kind must have 10 or more acres in production and have an income of at least $1,000 in order to qualify for property tax breaks, said David McLeod, general counsel for the department.

The proposed bill would lower that acreage requirement to five acres, said Rep. Phil Haire, D-Sylva, who is sponsoring the bill.

“To me it’s a matter of fairness,” Haire said.

Authoring of the bill was motivated by recent news reports about the trout industry attempting to recover from last year’s floods and grow as an agricultural business. North Carolina trout farming is a $16 million per year industry, with most of the farms generating that income located in the Western part of the state.

Area agricultural department extension agents have been circulating news of the proposed bill through the farming community.

“This is something I’ve been concerned about because my property is less than 10 acres,” said Alex Denison, owner of Otter Creek Trout Farm in Macon County.

Denison, who left the plumbing business in Chattanooga, TN in 2002 to become a trout farmer in North Carolina, holds approximately seven acres of land and produces as many as 60,000 pounds of trout per year. He raises rainbow and brook trout for commercial sales and the stocking of private creeks and ponds.

When Denison bought the trout farm, land records showed that the entirety of the farm was recorded on one deed. Come tax time, however, he learned that one of his undeveloped acres was recorded separately from the rest. That single acre was valued at $11,000. The rest of the property — six acres where the trout farm, outbuilding and his home are located — were valued at $4,400 an acre.

Denison plans to one day expand onto the unused acre by adding two new raceways — the long, fishtank type holding pens where trout are kept — and a settling pond. The expansion still would not bring Denison up to the agriculture department’s 10-acre minimum for tax breaks.

“It would definitely affect my taxes,” Denison said of the proposed bill.

Another bonus to the bill is that the amount of trout produced will factor into a business’s ability to receive tax breaks. The proposed bill includes a clause that makes small, but higher producing farms still eligible for the breaks.

“It’s five acres, or, if a small tract, 20,000 pounds of trout,” Haire said.

The concept of production amounts versus the physical size of a farm appeals to many owners of smaller farms, who say they can do more with fewer acres than other farmers.

“You can produce so much protein on a limited amount of acreage,” said Sunburst Trout Farm owner Steve Eason. “When you speak of acreage that should be more of an agrarian issue than an aqua-culture issue.”

Should the bill pass, Haire said it would help facilitate the trout industry’s growth within WNC and possibly replace jobs lost in the manufacturing sector without the loss of tax revenue posing a threat.

“I don’t think it will have a significant impact on the overall county budgets involved,” Haire said.