Farming Law Considered Too Permissive [VIDEO]

The Chatham Township Planning Board agreed Monday to narrow and add detailed specifications to a draft ordinance allowing market gardens as a conditional use.

Lydia Chambers, the president of the planning board, said the board's role in this issue was "to provide guidance only," since the ordinance is still only proposed and has not been formally introduced and submitted.

The board was to provide feedback and suggest changes that would help the ordinance fit into the township's Master Plan, after listening to the opinions of the board attorney, the board planner and members of the public.

Francis Benisch, the board's planner, said the Master Plan outlines two basic goals: To enhance Chatham Township's residential character as predominately single-family homes and "protecting dwindling farmland."

Under the Master Plan, Benisch said, with permission required from the Planning Board seemed an "enlightened" way to go. It would allow the board to "take these competing interests...and find a way to balance them."

Also, if farming was allowed as a permitted use (which does not require permission by any township board) instead of a conditional use, the board expressed concerns that the Right to Farm Act could take precedence over any other existing zoning or environmental laws.

"The conditional use is a great way to [allow market gardens], but we need to make it tighter," Chambers said.

The board attorney and Benisch agreed to make changes to the ordinance, according to public comments and discussion from board members, and to distribute the new draft before the item next comes up on the board agenda for the Dec. 19 meeting.

Public Comments

Comments from the public on the draft ordinance took nearly two hours, with both sides of the debate represented.

Chris Struening, a Green Village Road resident, asked the board to look into the long-term effect of proximity to farming on the development of children. He cited his own family, with two children under age 4, and said he did not want to live in a place where air quality could be threatened by pesticides and herbicides allowed under the ordinance as currently proposed.

"If this goes through, I feel like I am being forced out of my house," he said.

Dan Miller, one of the two Green Village landowners who wants to use part of his property as a market garden, said his neighbors did not need to worry about the use of chemical pesticides.

"I'm not using that on my property," he said.

As he has done in past meetings, Miller discussed land in Green Village that his family farmed for years.

"The only thing we want to do now is take [the produce grown] to the farmers market," he said. "We promote these locally grown vegetables, but we don't promote growing them in our own town."

Tom Bucuk, the second homeowner who first approached the committee about allowing small farms, was present at the meeting but did not address the board.

Shirley Honickel, who lives across the street from Miller's property, told the board that in her 77 years of living in Green Village, "frankly, I don't remember any farming there. ... We all had gardens, we all had chickens, we had a horse for our pleasure, for riding. ... I don't remember farming."

Jeannette Miller, Dan's mother, said she was surprised at Honickel's statement.

"I don't know why Shirley doesn't remember, because she lives across the street," she said. "Everything we had to eat, my father and my uncle farmed on that land."

Kristen Struening expressed the sentiments of many when she said the ordinance was too permissive.

"If things change or [the neighbors] sell, what happens then?" she asked.

Richard Templin, of Green Village Road, said he objected to the idea that farming the land would preserve open space.

"I know we all say, 'Well, farming is a pleasant activity, ... and it doesn't cause any damage,' but in reality it is developed," he said. He also , asking for farming to not be permitted.

Too Permissive

The permissible practices under the market garden ordinance was discussed by the board, and several members said they were surprised by how much was allowed under the proposed precepts.

Mayor Nicole Hagner said the ordinance, which was drafted by Township Attorney Carl Woodward, Deputy Mayor Bob Gallop and herself, with input from the committee and public comments, was intended to fit many different farming operations within town.

"Certainly, we are open to [other restrictions]," Hagner said.

According to Hagner's estimations, 13 existing farms occupy approximately 125 acres of land in Chatham Township. These properties, she said, are both grandfathered in and farmland assessed. She also said there are an additional 42 properties in town that have enough space—3 acres or more—to qualify for the market garden ordinance.

Board Member Thomas Browne said he wanted to include restrictions within the ordinance that would protect the township's interest, should eligible property change hands.

"It's clear that the people who want this ordinance are sincere that they want a small-scale operation," he said, "but there's nothing in the ordinance that assures that would be the case in the long run."

Board Member Jonathan Cohn and Chambers also said they had concerns about a farming effort with more than one property owner.

"The scale of farming changes once it becomes a cooperative effort," Cohn said.

Hagner also said the ordinance draft was mistakenly specified to Green Village. "It was modified to allow [for] anywhere in the town where you have a specific acreage," she said, and the draft should have been corrected before it was posted to the township website.

"That's not something we would ever condone, spot-zoning," Chambers said.

The board agreed to make changes to the ordinance that would address concerns expressed during the public comments and to review the changes at the Dec. 19 meeting. Benisch told Chatham Patch a copy of the amended draft ordinance would be made available to the public in advance of the meeting.