Advisory board approves Huber family boundary change to resolve barn encroachment

The Harford County Agricultural Preservation Advisory Board voted unanimously March 19 to approve a boundary line change requested by the Huber family to eliminate a barn encroachment and allow a tenant house arrangement on farm property.

Staff member Jen Wilson described the request: the owners hold 21 Brocks Way, a roughly 53-acre property subject to a Harford County preservation easement, and 19 Brocks Way, a separate roughly 2.6-acre residential lot. Wilson said the Huber family asked to reconfigure the residential lot to remove an existing encroachment where a barn straddled the property line and to allow the house at 19 Brocks Way to become the tenant house for 21 Brocks Way. Wilson told the board the change would not be an equal-area exchange because the easement would receive more land than the lot would gain.

Mr. Huber told the board that he and his wife live in the main house at 21 Brocks Way and that his daughter currently lives at 19 Brocks Way; he said his son plans to live in the tenant house while working on the farm and that the next barn would support a future cattle operation. Huber also noted site constraints: a gas line along the top of a nearby hill prevents placement of a tenant house at that location.

Wilson reminded the board that, if approved, all barns on easement property must be used for agricultural purposes and not commercial business use; Huber acknowledged that requirement and said the next barn would be for the cattle operation. Jackie Smithson moved to approve the boundary line change; Bill Amoss seconded. The motion carried unanimously.

The board did not record conditions beyond the standard easement-use restriction noted by staff. The change was intended to resolve the immediate encroachment and allow the family to proceed with their planned farm operations.