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Estate and Succession Planning for the Family Farm: providing resources for a decade

In its 10^th year, the Estate & Succession Planning for the Family Farm workshop by the Indiana Agricultural Law Foundation continues to provide invaluable information to farmers.

Attorney John Shoup, director for the Indiana Ag Law Foundation, says the workshop was started with the knowledge that estate and succession planning impacts every single farm in the state. 

“Something is going to happen (to the farm). There’s going to be possibly a transition to the next generation or it might be sold, for example. People need to think about that and it’s certainly top of mind for a lot of farm families,” he says. “We wanted to put together a program that would provide them with information and potentially some resources to assist them in that process.”  

He tells Brownfield it can be challenging for families to begin the planning process.

“It’s family and often family relationships are complicated, sometimes difficult. That’s certainly a theme that we’ve had throughout the 10 years, along with the nuts and bolts of an estate plan, for example, explaining a will, trust, and power of attorney,” he says. “We also have included speakers that talk about the issues of family communication, family dynamics, and those issues are sometimes complicated than the actual estate plan itself. We felt good ten years ago about putting together the program and helping farm families and we anticipate continuing this into the future as well.”

Sessions this year included: estate planning 101 presented by John Colin, attorney at Simpson Colin LLC; four ways to lose the family farm presented by Dan Gordon, partner at Gordon & Associates, P.C.; bringing the next generation into the farming operation presented by Matt Folz, partner at Dobbs & Folz, LLC; and health plans for the family farm presented by Steve Allen, manager of Indiana Farm Bureau Health Plans.

The Indiana Agricultural Law Foundation was established in 2005 by Indiana Farm Bureau. Through its existence, INAgLaw has helped promote a better understanding of legal issues facing Indiana agriculture through support of precedent-setting litigation and educational programming.

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Audio: John Shoup