CUMBERLAND COUNTY, Pa. (WHTM) – A Cumberland County farmer turned down millions of dollars to turn his land into a data center.
Mervin Raudabaugh has lived on farmland in Silver Spring for decades. He milked cows there for 51 years and his mother died in his arms in a barn on the property.
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Last month, he sold development rights to the farm for about $2 million. One day, Laudabo could still sell the land itself, but only to someone willing to keep its farmland.
Raudabaugh closed the deal with a $15 million reward from a data center developer.
“They are approaching him and, in his opinion, they are harassing him to the point where his attorney is considering suing them in court,” said Laura Brown, coordinator of the town’s land conservation program. “So, that’s when I called Jeb [Musser] and the Lancaster Farmland Trust and say, ‘Hey, are you guys interested in conservation? ‘”
Silver Spring is one of four municipalities outside the Philadelphia area where voters decided to use a portion of their income taxes to purchase development rights to the land. The town says the average home costs $120 a year, and residents have reserved 21 properties since 2013.
“Once Laura contacted us, our board was very supportive of this,” said Jeb Musser, the trust’s vice president of land conservation. “These farms meet all our criteria for a good conservation farm.”
Many Pennsylvania residents don’t want data centers in their communities. National leaders warmly received him.
The town provides compensation to the nonprofit Lancaster Farmland Trust to hold and enforce the easement on the Laudabo land.
Laudabo likely sold the land as farmland for a few million dollars, which means that between that and the money he received to protect the land, he was getting less than half of what the data center people were offering.
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