I appreciate that it has taken many years to come to the place where the city can actually lease the city farm lands to the farmers. I applaud the effort made by all parties.

However, I don’t support a $1/year lease for 30 years. I don’t support that the farmers on city property have an economic advantage over their private counterparts where that advantage is funded by the community at large.

Starting at $1/year is OK, but this rate needs to be increased to full-lease payments returned to the city – less FOF lease management fees.

I believe that after about five years the FOF should receive 20 percent (more typical lease management fees) of the lease payment and the rest returned to the city.

That way, the FOF farmers would be paying market rates for the farm land, not getting any more “free” improvements. At that time, FOF farmers would be competing with the private farmers on equal ground.

I believe that such a change in language could have been introduced and the lease still approved in a timely manner.

Steve Bonkowski, Councilor-elect