Building on open space land - zoning?

[Josh_Whatcom]

Good evening all! 

I am being gifted some acreage out in Whatcom county WA that is currently zoned as open space / dairy, and want to keep it for that use (it is a field that gets hayed) and build a home on in.  I see many land owners around me have their land as open space / ranches, and ones who have bought property and built on it are now zoned as residential.  Does anyone know what I need to do to keep the land as open space?  (I plan on developing < 10% of it).

Thank you!

[MountainDon]

Good evening all! 

Does anyone know what I need to do to keep the land as open space? 

Where I am, depending on the size of the parcel, it is common to designate 1 acre of the plot as residential and the balance as agricultural. Taxes are higher on the residence portion, but quite low if it can be actually zoned as ag use. There will be requirements for that. There may be some other in between tax rate designation as well. I'm not sure of the minimum acreage requirement to do that ( 5 or 10?) but that will vary from county to county, state to state. Ask at the county assessor's office.