The Moore County Board of Commissioners have unanimously agreed to appeal a recent Superior Court ruling that could have a far-reaching impact on the property rights of local farmers.

At the center of this nearly two year-long dispute are West End farmer Watts Auman; the Seven Lakes Aeromodelers, a club that leases a portion of Auman's property for twice weekly sessions flying remote-controlled model airplanes; and Samuel and Elizabeth Blackwell, a Wake Forest-based couple who own an adjacent ten-acre tract on NC Highway 73, near its intersection with Beulah Hill Church Road.

On Tuesday, November 13, the County Commissioners held a Special Meeting to decide whether to appeal Judge James Webb’s ruling that rescinded the club’s permit to fly on the basis that their use does not constitute a farming activity and, therefore, should not be allowed in a Voluntary Agricultural District [VAD]. Last week, the Moore County Board of Adjustment met in Closed Session before unanimously recommending that the Commissioners seek the appeal. In addition, the Board of Adjustment recommended the VAD ordinance should be revisited to ensure the interests of farmers are protected.

Commissioner Jimmy Melton recused himself from discussing the case, as he owns property adjacent to both the Blackwell and Auman properties.

Rulings, Appeals, and More Rulings

The Blackwells objection to the Aeromodelers use of the Auman property originally came to county attention as a noise ordinance complaint in early 2011, not long after the Blackwells purchased their undeveloped tract. The Planning Staff brought the matter before the Planning Board, to determine whether the County's Zoning Ordinance needed to be revised to more precisely define recreational uses of property.

But the Planning Board determined no ordinance revision was necessary, and instead indicated that it was within the discretion of the Planning Director, acting as Zoning Administrator, to determine whether the Aeromodelers use of the property was authorized under the Zoning Ordinance.

Moore County's Planning Director at the time was Joey Raczkowski, who determined that the Aeromodelers were a club, and that clubs were permitted on the Auman property under the ordinance.

The Blackwells challenged that decision before the Board of Adjustment in two hearings held in July and November 2011, but that panel upheld Raczkowski's decision.

The couple then appealed the case to Superior Court, where Judge Webb, rather than focusing on the Zoning Ordinance, determined that the Aeromodelers use was a non-farming use of the land, which violated the VAD Ordinance. Webb pointed to wording in the VAD Ordinance that said it trumped other Moore County ordinances, including the Zoning Ordinance.

The Westside Board may become smaller and meet less frequently, if two Nominating Committee recommendations prove as popular with the membership as they appear to be with the current Directors.

During the Tuesday, November 13 Work Session of the Seven Lakes West Landowners Association [SLWLA] Board of Directors, Secretary Jane Sessler recommended that the Board downsize from the current nine to seven members, and that it drop its second-Tuesday Work Session, holding only one evening business meeting each month.

"The Committee would like to make some changes," Sessler told her fellow Board members. "One of them would be to change our meeting schedule to minimize the time that Directors have to spend in meeting, having one general meeting in the evening." Eliminating the monthly Work Session, which is currently held on a weekday morning, might make serving on the Board more attractive to younger members, she added.

"There is lots of communication via email between Board members," Sessler noted. "And we also have a website, with a strong flow of information in both directions."

The Nominating Committee's second suggestion was to drop the number of Directors on the Board from nine to seven members, she explained. Sessler said the community has a strong management company that is increasingly handling the day-to-day issues that were once handled by Directors. And she suggested that making use of committees that are not necessarily chaired by a Director could also reduce Director workload.

President Mick Herdrich noted that the meeting schedule can be changed by a simple vote of the Board. Changing the number of Directors would require an amendment to the bylaws, which is a more involved process. He said that the Board would solicit public comment on both issues, with a possible vote on dropping the Work Session in December. A change in the size of the Board, Herdrich suggested, would likely not be voted on until after the Annual Meeting in March.

Herdrich asked each Director to comment on Sessler's proposals; and there was strong support for dropping the Work Session.

The November day was bright and warm, as former members of the armed forces gathered with family, friends, and neighbors at the Veteran's Memorial in Carthage to celebrate Veteran’s Day, one day early. But the Saturday, November 10 festivities had some somber notes, particularly when participants remembered Staff Sergeant Justin Cameron Marquez, a twenty-five-year-old Aberdeen native who was killed in October while on foot patrol in Afghanistan.

Many local officials attended the service, including Moore County Commissioners Tim Lea, Jimmy Melton, Craig Kennedy, and newly elected Commissioner Randy Saunders. District Attorney Maureen Krueger, Clerk of Superior Court Susan Hicks, and Carthage Mayor Lee McGraw were also on hand, as was NC Representative Jamie Boles.

 “It’s a beautiful day, and it’s humbling that we can come out and honor the veterans for what they sacrificed," Boles said. "We also should recognize what their families sacrificed. We take for granted going to bed with our families safe at home, when their loved ones are not."

The expansion plans for a Seven Lakes mini-storage business won the approval of the Moore County Planning Board, which voted unanimously on Thursday, November 8, to revise a conditional use permit sought by Euromax, LLC.

The firm, owned by Moore County GIS Director Chris Koltyk, currently operates an mini storage facility on a 0.69-acre lot at 140 Auman Street, an unpaved road that runs between Trade and MacDougall in Seven Lakes Business Village.

The new conditional use permit covers that lot and an adjacent 0.344 acre lot recently acquired by Euromax. The additional acreage allowed a configuration of the site plan for the property, which could eventually hold six storage buildings, one of which includes a woodworking shop, surrounded by a perimeter fence. There is currently one building on the site.

The revised conditional use permit requires that the lots be formally recombined prior to development. It limits building height to sixteen feet, imposes standards for outdoor lighting, and prohibits outdoor storage.

Noting that another, nearby storage business in the Village offers outdoor storage, Planning Board member Rodney Pickler questioned that restriction. Planner Tim Garner explained that the zoning ordinance prohibits outdoor storage, but the existing other storage facility predates the development of the ordinance and thus is grandfathered, as an "existing, non-conforming use." The use can continue, but it can't be expanded, Garner said.

Answering question from other members of the panel, Garner explained that the conditional use permit includes no setback requirements, because the Seven Lakes Village Business District has no setback requirements in the Zoning Ordinance. There are no buffering or screening conditions on the permit, because it is surrounded by other commercial properties.

The Seven Lakes Aeromodelers may have to find a new home, unless Moore County's Board of Commissioners decides to appeal a recent decision by Superior Court Judge James M. Webb.

The Aeromodelers club, a group of radio-controlled model airplane enthusiasts with a nearly-three-decade history, have flown their planes over a 60-acre pasture near West End, rented from T. Clyde Auman Farms, since the Fall of 2010. But Judge Webb found that Auman's land is part of a Voluntary Agricultural District, and that designation prevents its use for non-farm uses. The Aeromodelers' clubhouse, runways, and taxiways, are, Webb concluded, non-farm uses.

The case came before Webb on appeal from a decision by the Moore County Board of Adjustment. The non-resident owners of an adjacent ten-acre tract of land -- Samuel A. Blackwell, III and Elizabeth Blackwell of Raleigh -- who purchased their property as a homesite in January 2010, discovered that the Aeromodelers were using the adjacent tract. They complained to the Moore County Planning Department, which, at first, had some difficulty how best to handle the dispute.

Ultimately, with the backing of the Planning Board, then Planning Director Joey Raczkowski, relying on his authority as Zoning Administrator, found that the Aeromodelers' use of Auman's property was a permitted recreational use, under the Moore County Zoning ordinance.

The Blackwells appealed to the County's Board of Adjustment, which heard the case in July of 2011 and backed Raczkowski's decision.

The Blackwells then appealed to Superior Court, where Judge Webb ruled that the Aeromodelers' activities were a non-farm use, and therefore prohibited by the County's Voluntary Agricultural District [VAD] Ordinance. Webb said the case represented a "conflict of ordinances," that the Voluntary Agricultural District Ordinance, in this case, trumps the Zoning Ordinance, and that the Board of Adjustment had made an error of law in its decision.