In addition to the PACE program, Fayette County KY passes a bill in 1998 to establish a Purchase of Development Rights program (KRS 67A.840-850).

There are several types of programs in use around the country today and several purposes to be achieved.

Purposes are :
• a) environmental,
• b) aesthetic,
• c) agrarian,
• d) anti-growth. However, since this ranking is purely a statistical explanation of the variance structure of the data set, it should not be interpreted as a ranking of the concept of these social objectives (Harman 1976).

  Methods are :

• a) purchase of development rights by the state.
• b) use-value tax assessments, preferential use tax reductions.
• c) zoning and other regulation, which must follow constitutionality guidelines of "taking" under the 5th Amendment.
• d) fee simple-purchase of land.
• e) right-to-farm legislation, protecting land for it's agrarian benefits.
• f) provision of institutional foundations for voluntary programs from private funds.
• g) TDRs

If it works right, says Pruetz, this exchange creates a win-win-win situation. The government can downzone or otherwise restrict development in valued areas (sending areas) without spending scarce tax dollars to purchase the land outright or compensate irate property owners. The sending-area property owners do not lose the value of potential development, because they can sell those rights to those in the receiving area. Receiving-area property owners can buy those rights and gain the chance to build more densely (hence more profitably), at less cost than acquiring more land. The following book is said to be the last word on TDRs.

Pruetz, Rick; Saved by Development: Preserving Environmental Areas, Farmland and Historic Landmarks with Transfer of Development Rights Rick Pruetz. Arje Press, Burbank, CA, 1997.437 pp. $39.95. This is a study of 107 Transfer of Development Rights (TDR) programs across the country beginning with surveys from 3,500 counties, cities, townships, and villages.

Three major TDR programs:

• Montgomery County Maryland has protected over 29,000 acres of viable farmland.
• The New Jersey Pinelands program has saved 13,000 acres in 60 separate jurisdictions.
• Malibu, California has retired 1,000 substandard lots in more than 500 transfers.

• Several other states with some programs are :

• Connecticut - established in the 1970's it has acquired 167 farms totaling 25,450 acres, with130,000 acres of farmland as a goal.
• Maryland, Anne Arundel County has the Installment Payment Alternative (IPA). Calvert County has TDRs. Also the innovative Rural Legacy program involves more than twenty counties. Also the Calvert Farmland Trust and Patuxent Tidewater Land Trust.
• Florida,
• Georgia
• Minnesota,
• Oregon,
• Virginia, Loudoun County - Purchase of Development Rights.
• New York, Westchester County, Long Island, & Hudson Valley. New York has invested $18 million since 1996.
• Colorado has
• a) a preferential use-value tax assessment program (Aiken 1989)
• b) right-to-farm legislation that protects land for its agrarian benefits. In addition, a voter-approved referendum enabled the creation of the
• c) Great Outdoors Colorado Trust Fund in 1992 that receives funding through state lottery proceeds for the purpose of preserving, protecting, and enhancing the state's wildlife, parks, river, trail, and open space heritage. There are 38 private land preservation institutions active in Colorado (Colorado Dept. of Agriculture 1995). Four of these private institutions are national in scope, five are statewide in scope, one is specifically concerned with land in Routt County, and the rest are regional or county oriented. These private institutions (national-The Nature Conservancy, Trust for Public Lands, American Farmland Trust, The Conservation Fund; state-Colorado Open Lands, Colorado Wildlife Heritage, Colorado Coalition of Land Trusts; and regional or county-various county land trusts, county land conservancies, and environmental foundations) all have mission statements that specifically target (and overlap) different benefits that are provided by agricultural land, including environmental, open space, heritage, quality-of life, community, and agrarian benefits. Thus, there is a form of institutional specialization already present in the land preservation arena.