Sociology Commons^™

Smart Growth And Wisconsin Agriculture, Douglas B. Jackson-Smith

Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology Faculty Publications

Relatively low and volatile agricultural commodity prices have placed increasing pressure on the state’s farm sector in the 1990s. At the same time, an unusually robust non-farm economy has generated significant demand for rural housing and recreational land development. The result has been a dramatic acceleration in the rate of farmland conversion to non- farm uses over the last 15 years. Non-farm growth pressures have affected many other aspects of Wisconsin’s urban and rural landscape as well. To help communities grapple with these new challenges, the state legislature passed a new “Smart Growth” law in the fall of 1999 (1999 …