HB2018

HB2018 makes agricultural or timber use and productivity explicit considerations in the Texas Farm and Ranch Lands Conservation Program. The program helps purchase conservation easements from willing sellers. An easement leaves ownership with the landowner while placing agreed limits or duties on use of the property for conservation purposes; this is not a law requiring every farm or timber tract to enter the program. Parks and Wildlife Code 84.002–84.003; Natural Resources Code 183.001.

The revised definition requires an agricultural conservation easement to be designed to maintain the land’s agricultural or timber use, as well as accomplish at least one listed conservation purpose: water quality or quantity, native wildlife habitat, rare or sensitive plants, or large open-space tracts threatened by development or fragmentation. The program council’s authority to ensure consistency of purchased easements now expressly includes maintaining agricultural or timber use and conserving wildlife habitat or water, alongside preserving open space. Final law, Sections 1–2.

For grant awards, the council must give priority to applications protecting and maintaining the agricultural or timber productivity of land susceptible to development, subdivision or fragmentation. Agricultural or timber productivity also becomes an express scoring consideration. Other listed factors remain: landscape and watershed integrity, native habitats, additional public or private funding, proximity to protected land, the easement’s perpetual or 30-year term, and an agreed resource-management plan approved by the council. Productivity is a consideration, not an automatic grant entitlement. Final law, Section 3.

The changes took effect September 1, 2025. HB2018 does not set a new appropriation amount, award a particular property a grant or remove the program’s other land and applicant requirements. Final law.