The second land succession-planning workshop was held at the Garberville Veterans Hall on Monday evening. The workshop is aimed at owners of family farms, ranches and timberland and urges them to plan for what will happen to their land when they die. The workshop is based on a program developed by Clint Benz and Mark Green for Oregon State University. Deborah Giraud, Community Development Advisor, and Director Yana Valachovic of the U.C. Cooperative Extension in Eureka conducted the workshop.

The first workshop was timed to take place before Thanksgiving and the Christmas holidays and provided the attendees with a template of discussions they needed to have with their family members. Most of those who attended the first section returned for the second and reported that they had made some progress and felt they were headed in the right direction.

The critical marker for planning for the participants was the Heirloom Scale, which the landowner uses to determine their “tie” to the land. It ranges on one end from a source of ready cash to a priceless family heirloom at the other.

This workshop focused on ownership issues, the first being a family meeting to talk about the property. Once the current owners, the parents or grandparents, are clear about where they stand on the Heirloom Scale, the idea is to write down goals, discuss them with other family members, and write an action plan.

Owners were encouraged to see their property as a family business and to create a family business ownerships structure that recognized the “sweat equity” of younger family members. The tendency is to want to divide property equally among heirs, but equal is not always fair when some family members are more involved in the actual operation of the business. Also stressed was the need to deal with family conflicts and to have regular family business meetings to keep everyone informed of what is happening in the business.

Valachovic and Giraud also stressed the importance of writing down guidelines for future generations that include the family story of the property, its history and the way it’s been managed, even designating a family historian.

Also of importance is making opportunities for getting everyone together on the land and making sure that those family meetings include recreational activities and pleasant experiences that will encourage the younger members to develop a relationship with the land. Pick a member of the next generation to groom and train for taking over the business of managing the land in the future and remember that developing a plan is a process not a transaction.

A distinction is drawn between ownership and management and the importance of being able to have an adult conversation outside the confines of family dynamics. Not everyone who is an owner will be capable of being a manager as well.

Estate planning is essential to the succession plan and starts with a will or living trust. Creating a business structure requires planning for who and how decisions are made, what happens if one of the family members withdraws from the business, planning for tax liabilities and improvement costs. The tendency is to make plans inflexible when it’s better to take a 100-year view and make a flexible plan. None of us knows what the conditions will be in 100 years, but family dynamics don’t change, Giraud noted.

”Put yourself in the shoes of your great-granddaughter and ask yourself what she will need,” Giraud said.

The importance of getting experienced professionals to help in the process was stressed. Most estate planners will suggest dividing the assets as quickly as possible, so land owners who want to preserve their land legacy need to search out planners who specialize in multi-generational planning.

You can learn about succession planning at the website: tiestotheland.com.