Disney, for example, quietly grazes cattle on two plots of land in Osceola County. Raising cows lets Disney claim a lower property tax rate for agricultural use. But last fall, county appraisers tried to strip Disney of the $50,000 break when they noticed that the cows had disappeared and the fields where they grazed had gone fallow. Disney appealed, arguing that the cows were rotated off the fields for awhile, but that they had returned and weren't always visible from the roadway.
The special master in the case sided with Disney, leaving the $26 billion entertainment giant's farming exemption intact.
Orange County is in a similar battle with the Universal Studios theme park and resort, which now says it is also in the business of farming pine trees. Universal trims $1.4 million from its tax bill by growing four-inch saplings on some prime county real estate. The county argues that Universal's true interest is not in agriculture but in developing the land, and is asking a state court to make the company pay up. "They built a road through the property, they put a power station on it and mitigated most of the environmental problems there, and now they're telling us it's just a tree farm," says Bill Donegan, Orange County's property appraiser. "This is a farce."
