Pender County study: residential properties demand most county services while agriculture produces large but outward-flowing income

At a May workshop of the Pender County Planning Board, Mark Seitz, County Cooperative Extension Director for North Carolina State University, presented the results of an internally produced cost-of-community-services study and analysis of the county's trade “pull” factors.

Seitz said the study allocates county revenue and expenditures across residential, commercial and agricultural property types and compares Pender County with other counties. “We have a pull factor of about 0.77,” Seitz said, describing how much retail activity the county retains relative to nearby counties. He told the board that agriculture in 2023 generated about $238,000,000 in crop and livestock sales and that, when accounting for regional spinoff, that figure could imply well over $300,000,000 in economic activity.

The study, based on 2023 audited county finances, shows residential property makes up about 87% of the tax base by value, commercial about 6.6% and agriculture about 6.3%. Seitz reported county budget figures for the year used in the analysis: roughly $99.8 million in total budgeted revenues. Of that, about $74.0 million was attributable to residential property, $21.3 million to commercial and $4.2 million to agricultural property. On the expenditure side, Seitz reported about $77.0 million spent toward residential, $33.5 million toward commercial and $2.4 million toward agricultural property in the same year.

Using those allocations, Seitz said agricultural land produced roughly $1.74 in revenue for every dollar of county service cost attributed to it, while commercial property produced about $6.00 in revenue per dollar of service. “Residential property actually cost the county 4¢ on the dollar for every dollar that it generated,” he said, meaning the county spent more on services for residential property than it collected in property tax from that category, as allocated in the study.

Seitz described the county as geographically large and one of the state's faster-growing counties, located adjacent to New Hanover County and influenced by it economically. He said that Pender’s regional retail pull is comparatively weak: “On a state level basis [Pender] only generate[s] 0.4% of the state's total retail business,” and that his calculations show Pender County residents spend an estimated 28¢ of every dollar outside the county (a county-level pull factor of about 0.72 reported for 2024 in Seitz’s slides). He also noted variation in pull-factor calculations depending on whether comparisons were made across the entire state or a smaller southeastern district, which produced different numerical pull factors in his slides (examples cited in the presentation included 0.69, 0.72 and 0.85 in different comparisons).

Planning staff told the board the county's land-use consultant previously recommended a substantially higher commercial share—about 25–30%—than the roughly 6–8% commercial share shown in the current tax base. Staff noted that such a shift would affect grant competitiveness because the state's tier ranking determines local matching requirements for some grants; a lower tier (greater distress) reduces required local matches.

Board members and staff discussed how development pressure is reducing farmland, and board members raised policy questions such as whether tax incentives could help keep family farms. A board member asked whether lowering agricultural tax rates would reduce the incentive to sell farmland; the board agreed that taxation policy would be a separate policy issue for the county commissioners rather than the planning board.

The board did not adopt any policies or make formal recommendations during the workshop. The future land use map presentation that was scheduled for the same meeting was tabled for a future session so absent board members can review the consultant materials.

Why it matters: The study’s allocations and the county’s trade pull results affect how Pender competes for retail business and how state-tier calculations can change grant-match obligations. The board indicated interest in the findings but took no formal action; staff and consultants will provide materials for further review.