Further to the above – I also had agreed with Ian that there appears to be no point of difference in the legilsation for funded and non funded.
The Biodiversity Conservation Trust have advised the following:
Rate exemptions are provided for under section 555(1)(b1) of the Local Government Act 1993 for land that is the subject of a conservation agreement. Note that there is no delineation between ‘funded’ and ‘unfunded’ agreements. A proportional reduction is applied to this exemption (see 555(3)).
In the context of your question, landholders with the following agreements are therefore eligible for these rate exemptions:
• Unfunded in-perpetuity CA’s including those under the BC Act 2016 and previous legislation
• Funded CA’s
BSAs are not eligible under the current s555 exemption. These agreements are used to secure biodiversity offsets that are required under the NSW Biodiversity Offsets Scheme.
For funded CA’s, there is no distinction in relation to being ‘in perpetuity’ agreements.
