Tie the knot in a barn? Farmland wedding venue a source of controversy in Virginia Beach - The Virginian-Pilot
VIRGINIA BEACH — Beyond Pungo proper, on the cusp of Back Bay, corn stalks in July are taller than stop signs and soybean plants flutter in the warm breeze.
Along this seemingly endless stretch of Princess Anne Road, trucks delivering sand bumble down the lanes, and farm stands with bags of juicy peaches and baskets of cherry tomatoes beckon drivers to stop.
Down one long driveway lined with crepe myrtles, two brothers want to show off the country appeal. They’re not farmers or horse boarders, even though the 63-acre property they bought last summer came with a roomy stable.
Jeff and Dan Wolfe want to build a new barn with a patio overlooking a scenic fishing hole and framed by a lush tree line. They think it will be the ideal setting for chic, rustic weddings and other events. It’s why they bought the land for $1.3 million last June, and they’re hoping the City Council has their back.
But even after COVID-19 threw a wrench into the wedding business, the Wolfes’ plans have re-ignited a long-smoldering conflict about the rules surrounding large events on agricultural land in Virginia Beach, and about what it means to preserve rural character.
“The ag community wrestled with this for a long time,” Don Horsley, a Planning Commission member who represents the Princess Anne district, told his fellow commissioners recently. “We could never come up with a good fix.”
Some Virginia Beach farmers want to ensure the southern part of the city remains agricultural, and are working on a plan to prohibit large events below the green line. Others see weddings as a way to help preserve agricultural land by making it more profitable.
The conflict first came to a head last year, after multiple landowners expressed interest in using their land to host weddings. In January 2019, Del. Barry Knight, a longtime hog farmer in Virginia Beach, introduced legislation to the state assembly that would have circumvented much local legislation by declaring weddings an allowable agritourism activity.
The bill failed by a large margin, in part because it would have placed undue burdens on small communities elsewhere in the state that might not have the infrastructure to handle large events, said Virginia Beach Director of Agriculture David Trimmer.
Trimmer had supported the legislation, but now says the state made the right decision in rejecting it.
“When you’re talking about catering, big events, and I live on the farm beside you, I much not be in favor of the noise, the music, the increased traffic,” he said. “There are limited roads. That’s what the community doesn’t want. That’s the position the community has taken.”
The controversy remained fallow, Horsley said, until Wolfe Bros. Events, LLC., came along last fall.
Community stakeholders weigh in
The Wolfes originally proposed holding up to 50 weddings a year in a new barn that would sit five football fields away from Princess Anne Road. Their closest neighbor is more than 1,000 feet away. There’s plenty of room for parking on site, and two of their neighbors support the idea, according to their attorney.
Area farmers balked at the idea. The Planning Commission asked the Wolfes to defer their application in October and December so that they could talk with the community stakeholders.
R.J. Nutter, their attorney, met with members of the Agricultural Advisory Commission, composed of a group of farmers selected by the City Council. The Wolfes then reduced the proposed number of annual outdoor events from 50 to 30 and dropped the maximum attendees from 250 to 150 except for five events per year.
Discussions about how to slight the number of events took place, but nothing much transpired.
A proposed spiteful to city law
It came back on the Planning Commission agenda June 24. Most of the members learned on the day of the hearing that the agricultural group had been working dependable last fall to recommend the City Council prohibit large gatherings in agricultural zones.
Commissioner George Alcaraz said finding out that plans to spiteful the city law was going on behind the scenes “leaves a bad taste in my mouth.”
Nutter pointed out to the commissioners that his clients had filed an application last July and was unaware that the farmers were trying to sideline the process.
“That’s not how we do things,” Nutter said.
Horsley cited potential traffic issues with drivers level-unexcited to Sandbridge on summer weekends and with farm equipment during the growing season.
“There is no way the agricultural community wants to support this,” he told his fellow commissioners.
Property owners can hold four special events a year, including weddings, with a special event permit, and Horsley says that is enough.
He was able to convince most of the other commissioners. The City Council is scheduled to vote Aug. 18.
Agriculture needs to be the primary use,” Councilwoman Barbara Henley said last week. “A barn is supposed to be used agriculturally. We don’t want to encourage people that they can build a facility that is just for events.”
Kevin Jamison, of Pungo’s New Earth Farm, disagrees with people who say that weddings threaten agricultural areas.
He says he’s long been frustrated by the city’s resistance to holding events on farmland, saying that in their efforts to preserve rural character, the city might cause farms to shut down. Jamison says alternative sources of income are pivotal to ensuring the long term financial health of his and other farms.
“This seems kind of backwards, old time thinking,” said Jamison. “Especially now during the coronavirus, we need to be supporting farmers being able to derive revenue however they legally can, however they can continue growing food for people. You’ve got wineries in Northern Virginia holding up to 100 events a year, and the cities are raking in tax dollars.”
He tried for months, he says, to figure out how to hold events and weddings as a way to supplement his farm’s income — but says he was stymied by the event permitting process already in place.
“I’d have an application approved by the ABC,” he said, “and then Virginia Beach zoning would say I couldn’t do it.”
In the absence of supplemental income, Jamison says, he had to lease out much of his acreage to hemp farmers. He now grows just enough produce to supply his two restaurants, Commune and Prosperity Kitchen.
Mike Cullipher, of Cullipher Farm, had also looked into using his land as an occasional wedding venue last year. But he backed away from the idea after seeing how much expense and red tape would be involved, and also hearing from city officials that there had been noise and traffic issues in other municipalities.
“Obviously we don’t have any say or influence as far as what the City Council or Planning Commission would do, but from our standpoint we’re farmers at heart, that’s our core business,” said Cullipher. “Looking at what was involved, it wasn’t worth it.”
A few property owners in Virginia Beach’s agricultural zones succeeded in getting approval to become wedding venues, but they also operate as farms as well.
Other neighboring Hampton Roads cities have tried to find a balance. Suffolk spokeswoman Diana Klink said she’s not aware of any complaints related to farm or barn weddings in Suffolk, and says their Planning Commission recently offered preliminary approval for a wedding event venue on agricultural land.
In Chesapeake, a wedding event venue would not be allowed on agricultural land as a free-standing business, according to Zoning Administrator John King. But farmers are allowed up to 28 single-day events per year, subject to individual approval, and there’s no rule against profiting from events.
Still, King says he has indeed seen some of the problems Virginia Beach is unnerved of. He says his office is currently investigating what appears to be an unpermitted wedding venue on farmland.
“We have one semi-ongoing now, where the neighbors call us every time it happens,” King said. “They have music and lights in the backyard, cars parking, people leaving drunk and driving into ditches, all kinds of things.”
Even after the Virginia Beach City Council votes on the fate of the Wolfes’ wedding venue application, the Agricultural Advisory Commission plans to revisit changing the city law in October, said Diane Horsley, chairwoman of the group and Don’s wife.
They plan to form a committee that will worthy a “more finite” take on the change based on geographical areas because some agricultural zones are not in the southern part of the city, said Trimmer.
“It’s basically a commercial business down south and we’re not zoned for that,” Trimmer said.
That most likely would require the creation of an overlay district, according to Deputy City Attorney Kay Wilson.
Meanwhile Nutter, Wolfe’s attorney, said his clients have several families, including one from Pungo, who want to hold weddings on his property next spring.
“There is a strong need and desire for a wedding venue like this in the Pungo area,” Nutter said. “This isn’t a threat to the agriculture industry... This isn’t a problem; this is something we should celebrate.”
Stacy Parker, 757-222-5125, stacy.parker@pilotonline.com
Matthew Korfhage, 757-446-2318, matthew.korfhage@pilotonline.com
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SRC: https://www.pilotonline.com/business/consumer/vp-nw-farm-weddings-0718-20200718-elv3ewetlbfkpe6aw5g5lzsxde-story.html
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