Jeffries v. Cnty. of Harnett
| Decision Date | 15 May 2018 |
| Docket Number | No. COA17-729,COA17-729 |
| Citation | 817 S.E.2d 36,259 N.C.App. 473 |
| Parties | Kent JEFFRIES, Petitioner, and Lynwood Hare, Frances L. Hare, Bobbie Lewis Jeffries, and Thomas Glenn Finch, Intervening Petitioners, v. COUNTY OF HARNETT, Respondent, and Drake Landing, LLC, William Dan Andrews, and Linda Andrews, Intervening Respondents. |
| Court | North Carolina Court of Appeals |
Troutman Sanders LLP, Raleigh, by Gavin B. Parsons, for petitioner-appellant and petitioner-appellee Kent Jeffries, and for intervening-petitioner-appellants and intervening-petitioner-appellees Lynwood Hare, Frances L. Hare, Bobbie Lewis Jefferies, and Thomas Glenn Finch.
No brief filed for respondent-appellee, Harnett County.
Bryant & Ivie, PLLC, Raleigh, by John Walter Bryant and Amber J. Ivie, for intervening-respondent-appellees and intervening-respondent-appellants Drake Landing, LLC, William Dan Andrews, and Linda Andrews.
William Dan Andrews and Linda Andrews own and operate Drake Landing, LLC (collectively, "intervening-respondents"), a recreational hunting and shooting enterprise operating in Harnett County. William Dan Andrews is also the sole proprietor of Andrews Farms, a bona fide commercial crop farm. Drake Landing operates a controlled hunting preserve and a variety of other commercial shooting activities on several acres of property it leases from Andrews Farms. Drake Landing has never obtained conditional-use permits to operate its hunting preserve or the other shooting activities on the basis that these activities constituted "agritourism" and were thus exempt from countywide zoning. Petitioner Kent Jeffries and intervening-petitioners Frances L. Hare, Bobbie Lewis Jeffries, and Thomas Glenn Finch (collectively, "petitioners") own residential property adjacent to or near Drake Landing. This case arose from Jeffries’ request that the local zoning authority determine whether thirteen different shooting activities offered at Drake Landing constituted agritourism and were thus exempt from countywide zoning, including a conditional-use permitting requirement. After several hearings and hearings on remand before the Harnett County Board of Adjustment ("Board"), the superior court entered multiple orders on the matter, three of which are on appeal.
First, intervening-respondents appeal from a 2012 superior court order that remanded a 2011 Board decision with instructions to allow petitioners to present evidence to satisfy their burden of establishing that Drake Landing’s shooting activities were unrelated to Andrews Farms’ farming operations and were thus not shielded from zoning regulation under the statutory farm exemption. On appeal, intervening-respondents assert the superior court misinterpreted the zoning ordinance and our General Statutes by concluding that a nexus must exist between the shooting activities and the farming operations, because the shooting activities constitute agritourism and no such nexus is required for agritourism activities to be shielded by the farm exemption from countywide zoning.
Second, intervening-respondents appeal from a 2014 superior court order that reversed in part a 2013 Board decision, in which the court concluded under its de novo interpretation of the statutory farm exemption that shooting activities involving continental shooting towers, 3D archery courses and ranges, sporting clays, skeet and trap ranges, rifle ranges, and pistol pits were not as a matter of law activities intended by the legislature to be shielded from zoning regulation, even when performed on bona fide farm property, and even when done in preparation for the rural activity of hunting. The 2014 order also remanded the case to the Board with instructions for it to issue adequate findings and conclusions to support its determination that the remaining challenged activity—Drake Landing’s operation of its controlled hunting preserve for domestically raised game birds—constituted a zoning-exempt agritourism activity. On appeal, intervening-respondents assert the superior court misinterpreted our General Statutes by concluding these other shooting activities were not "agriculture" in the form of "agritourism" but, instead, were "nonfarm purposes" as a matter of law, and were thus subject to zoning regulation.
Third, petitioners appeal from a 2017 superior court order that affirmed a 2016 Board decision entered on remand from the 2014 order. In its 2016 decision, the Board determined that Drake Landing’s operation of its hunting preserve was shielded from zoning under the statutory farm exemption. In its 2017 order, the superior court acknowledged that intervening-respondents filed the only petition for certiorari review of the 2016 Board decision, and that intervening-respondents conceded they raised no issue with that decision. The order also indicated the superior court judge refused to consider petitioners’ challenges to the Board’s 2016 decision because they failed to timely perfect an appeal from, or to raise any written objections to, the Board’s decision as required under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 160A–393. The superior court thus affirmed the 2016 Board decision. On appeal, petitioners assert the superior court misinterpreted our General Statutes by not concluding that operating a controlled hunting preserve is excluded from the definition of "agritourism" because it amounts to a "nonfarm purpose" as a matter of law and is thus subject to countywide zoning. Petitioners contend, alternatively, that even if operating a controlled hunting preserve is not precluded as a matter of law from the definition of "agritourism," the Board’s determination that Drake Landing’s particular controlled hunting preserve operation is zoning-exempt was not supported by substantial, competent evidence in the whole record and was thus arbitrary and capricious. Petitioners also contend the superior court erred by failing to adequately review the merits of the Board’s 2016 decision, since it refused to address their challenges to that decision.
After careful review, we affirm the 2014 and 2017 orders. We dismiss intervening-respondents’ challenges to the 2012 order because they failed to include in the appellate record the Harnett County Unified Development Ordinance (UDO), upon which they primarily rely to challenge that order, and because our dispositions of petitioners’ appeal from the 2017 order and of intervening-respondents’ appeal from the 2014 order renders moot any remaining challenges to the 2012 order.
William Dan Andrews is the sole proprietor of Andrews Farms, an undisputed bona fide farm. Andrews Farms owns over 2,000 acres of property and its agricultural operation currently consists of harvesting and producing crops, including, inter alia , tobacco, pine straw, soybeans, timber, and grain sorghum. Since the 1990s, a tract of around 240 acres of Andrews Farms’ property has been licensed as a controlled hunting preserve, and fowl such as pheasants and chukars have been domestically raised on the property for hunting purposes.
Around 2005, William Dan Andrews and his wife, Linda Andrews, established Drake Landing, a recreational hunting and shooting enterprise that operates on leased property from Andrews Farms. Drake Landing began its business by taking over the hunting preserve operation. Over time, however, Drake Landing added clay target throwers and other parts of the range to offer its patrons additional shooting activities beyond that of the early morning duck hunts and the afternoon pheasant, chukar, and quail hunts. According to the Board’s unchallenged finding on the matter, Drake Landing uses over 2,000 acres of Andrews Farms’ property to operate its hunting preserve but only about 100 to 120 acres to operate the other shooting activities.
In November 2010, petitioner Kent Jeffries, an adjacent property owner and the president of the North Harnett Property Rights Association, Inc. ("Property Rights Assoc."), wrote the Harnett County Planning Department to inquire as to whether the following shooting activities offered at Drake Landing constituted "agritourism" and were thus exempt from countywide zoning: (1) "hunting preserves"; (2) " ‘continental tower shoots’ for pheasant"; (3) "3–D archery courses and archery shooting ranges"; (4) "sporting clays and sporting clay courses"; (5) "skeet and trap ranges and other shotgun shooting stations"; (6) "pistol shooting pits and pistol shooting ranges"; (7) "rifle shooting ranges"; (8) "concealed carry handgun training"; (9) " ‘Three Gun’ firearms competitions"; (10) "IDPA (International Defensive Pistol Association) competitions, both sanctioned and non-sanctioned"; (11) "shotgun competitions, both sanctioned and non-sanctioned"; (12) "other forms of firearms competitions"; and (13) "corporate events hosted on an agritourism farm...."
On 18 January 2011, the zoning authority responded by letter in which it concluded (1) hunting preserves constitute agritourism; (2) continental tower shoots and (3) 3D archery courses and ranges, as "activities related to ... methods and weapons customarily used in the act of hunting in North Carolina," constituted agritourism; (4) sporting clays, (5) trap ranges, and (6) shotgun shooting stations constitute agritourism "when used ‘in preparation for the hunt’ "; (7) pistol pits and (8) rifle ranges, when "used to educate, enhance or assist in marksmanship skills for the purpose of hunting in a traditional manner ... would be considered a related use to the agritourism activity" because those training activities were "considered ‘preparing for the hunt’ "; and (9) corporate events involving these agritourism activities were similarly zoning-exempt. However, the zoning authority concluded, "concealed carry handgun courses, firearms competitions such as three gun and IDPA," and "tactical type training [were] not viewed as a form of agritourism."
Jeffries, individually and as president of the Property Rights Assoc., appealed the zoning authority’s...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Schooldev E. v. Town of Wake Forest
... ... on appeal." Mann Media, Inc. v. Randolph Cnty. Plan ... Bd. , 356 N.C. 1, 13, 565 S.E.2d 9, 17 (2002) (citations ... and internal quotation ... examination of the plain words of the statute." ... Jeffries v. Cnty. of Harnett , 259 N.C.App. 473, 488, ... 817 S.E.2d 36, 47 (2018) (citation omitted), ... ...
-
Schooldev E., LLC v. Town of Wake Forest, COA21-359
..."Statutory interpretation properly begins with an examination of the plain words of the statute." Jeffries v. Cnty. of Harnett , 259 N.C. App. 473, 488, 817 S.E.2d 36, 47 (2018) (citation omitted), disc. rev. denied , 372 N.C. 297, 826 S.E.2d 710 (2019). When language is "clear and unambigu......
-
Hampton v. KPM LLC
...than altering. See Ray, 366 N.C. at 10, 727 S.E.2d at 682 ; Ferrell, 334 N.C. at 659, 435 S.E.2d at 315 ; Jeffries v. Cty. of Harnett, 817 S.E.2d 36, 48 (N.C. Ct. App. 2018) ; see also Bryant v. United States, 768 F.3d 1378, 1385 (11th Cir. 2014) (applying North Carolina law). On the other ......
-
Golden Corral Corp. v. Ill. Union Ins. Co.
...the principle that "associated words explain and limit each other" applies "to all written instruments." Jeffries v. Cnty. of Harnett, 259 N.C. App. 473, 493, 817 S.E.2d 36, 50 (2018) (quotations and citation omitted). Defining "loss" as a "failure to ... utilize" does not comport with "dam......