Best interests

I had a discussion the other day about the conservation easement, Malt-O-Meal's decision to not honor it and the City of Lakeville's willingness to go along with not honoring that agreement.  The comment was made that "it's good to bring jobs into Lakeville".

I thought for a while about this and agree that it is good for a City to be business friendly and bring additional companies into the city.  I fully support being business friendly, but the bigger issue here is the honoring of an agreement and the intent of the original landowner who placed the conservation easement on this property.

The U.S. Treasury, when recognizing conservation easements, requires "To be considered an eligible donee under this section, an organization must be a qualified organization, have a commitment to protect the conservation purposes of the donation, and have the resources to enforce the restrictions".

Can the City of Lakeville, who willingly enters into an agreement to protect a piece of property in perpetuity, really be considered committed to protect the conservation purposes of the donation when they will allow a parking lot and office building to be built within that easement?
But getting back to the comment of business friendly, is the city better off cancelling a prior permanent agreement to preserve a piece of land to allow a parking lot and office building or are they better served by holding to the preservation principles and telling Malt-O-Meal that there are plenty of other open pieces of land available in the City of Lakeville and zoned appropriately without permanent conservation easements that will accommodate their building plans?  Directing the company to purchase additional properties that are not encumbered actually better serves the interest of the residents of the City of Lakeville and also recognizes the role the city took on to protect the conservation purposes.

This is not simply a question about changing zoning or allowing variances or approval of a building.  The question lies in the commitment of the City of Lakeville to honor and enforce the wishes and intentions put into a legal conservation easement document and the city's written commitment, evidenced by the city signing and recording the document, to enforce the intent of the document permanently.