Brighton preserves historic farm in $9 million acquisition

A $9 million acquisition will preserve a historic farm in Brighton. What makes the farm so unique? Its location and its water rights. 

The Wagner-Mayhew farm is located in the Historic Splendid Valley. 

"Originally when the pioneers first came out to Brighton, they called this the Splendid Valley. This feeds off of the Platte River valley," said Kyle Sylvester, Assistant Director of Parks and Open Space for Brighton. 

A mile and a half from Brighton city hall, it's one of Colorado's few remaining urban agricultural areas. 

"It's ideal for farming, it has really good drainage, really good soil content," Sylvester said. 

As Brighton grows, the land has been eyed by developers. 

"There are developers that would like to develop this. They buy the land, they dry it up, it loses its water rights, and then we lose our farming heritage by not having the farm ground," said Travis Haines, director of parks and recreation for Brighton. 

But the city wants to preserve its roots, and its water. 

"The water is tied to this property, it will not ever be dried up and it stays with this property," Haines said. 

With the help of the Conservation Fund, Brighton acquired the 116-acre farm, and its 115 shares of water rights, from the Mayhew family, who purchased the farm in the 1960s. 

Of the $9 million sale, $2 million comes from the city of Brighton, and the rest from Adams County Open Space and Great Outdoors Colorado grants. 

"A lot of the metro area was all farming communities years ago, and as were getting bigger and bigger, as Denver does, that gets less and less, and it's important to preserve these areas now," Sylvester said. 

Brighton finalized the sale this spring, and will now lease the property out to local farmers, hoping to boost the agricultural economy, and provide local produce to residents. 

"We have several farmers markets that are close that provide that and we're hoping to get our branding to a point where you can go to King Soopers or any other grocery store and find that Splendid Valley label so you know it's Colorado but it's also locally grown," Sylvester said. 

The acquisition comes with a conservation easement, meaning the land will be remain farmland forever. 

Brighton is working on acquiring and conserving several other properties in the Historic Splendid Valley.