Dave Markowitz
Member
Complaints kill shooting range, pigs coming now
Sunday, September 11, 2005
By Brian David, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
On the first day of August, Tom Belsterling saw his skeet-shooting business blown right out of the sky.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court declined that day to hear his appeal of a May 2003 decision by the New Sewickley zoning hearing board. The board had ruled Belsterling's skeet range illegal, and the decision had been upheld at every level of county and state court.
On the first day of September, lacking the ability to make further appeals, Belsterling went for a lack of appeal instead: He bought some pigs.
If he can't fill the air with buckshot and clay, he'll fill it with an odor. And neighbors who had angered him with their blunt objections to the noise of shotguns cannot complain; pig farming is absolutely allowed under the township's zoning ordinance.
"It's an agricultural activity, so go to it, I guess," said Dennis Goehring, chairman of the New Sewickley supervisors.
Belsterling, however, sees the skeet-shooting range as a normal activity for an agricultural area, too, and thinks the government and newcomer neighbors are overstepping their bounds.
"People are moving out of the city, moving to the country and saying 'We don't like what you're doing,' when you've been doing it as long as the land's been there," he said.
Belsterling's battle illustrates a common conflict in growing areas. People move out of more densely populated areas to find peace and quiet, only to discover that country folks do things like drive noisy tractors, spread smelly manure on their fields, ride four-wheelers and shoot guns.
Many of the complaints about Belsterling's shooting range came from people in Jackson; about 50 acres of his farm lie in that Butler County community.
There, the issue arose in the midst of a heated discussion over target areas at sportsmen's clubs. Jackson is host to three such clubs and had proposed an ordinance forcing any new shooting areas to be indoors. That sparked a vehement response from gun enthusiasts, and the township eventually backed off, settling for significant buffer zones instead.
It was also at a Jackson public hearing early in 2003 that Belsterling threatened to turn to pig farming, a particularly smelly, if profitable, business, if people found the sound of shotguns so upsetting.
"It's a balance," Jackson Supervisor Ralph DiLuigi said, talking about the rights of old-timers and newcomers, "and, sometimes, people have trouble finding that balance."
New Sewickley is similar to Jackson. It is essentially a rural municipality with growth spilling over from Cranberry. The Tri-County Commerce Park on Lovi Road and the neighboring Danbury Farms housing plan are both successful, nestled against the Cranberry border and drawing businesses and people looking for a place to build that's a bit less restrictive than that highly regulated community.
Goehring said the township was trying to be careful with that growth, protecting its rural character while encouraging the kind of development it wants in the areas where it wants it.
"There's nothing wrong with growth as long as it's controlled and is the kind of growth you want," he said.
Goehring said that was the goal when the township restricted commercial recreation in agricultural zones when it revised its zoning ordinance in 2002.
"In adjoining municipalities, we'd seen things like motocross courses and a paintball area," he said. "A lot of people move to this township to get into a rural atmosphere, and to have a commercial activity pop up next door is a little disconcerting."
Belsterling had an existing business on his then-250-acre farm: Gobbler's Knob Hunting Preserve, an area of about 60 acres where enthusiasts could bring their bird dogs and shotguns and hunt game birds.
He said he established the preserve shortly after buying the farm about six years ago, planting sorghum, sunflowers and corn to attract birds and making about enough to pay his property taxes.
Since that business predated the zoning ordinance, it was allowed to remain in place.
From early on, though, Belsterling said, customers had asked him about shooting skeet, essentially small clay discs launched into the air to mimic flying birds. He said he decided in May 2002 to create an area for it, and by October of that year, there was enough shooting going on to draw complaints from neighbors.
The legal case centered on exactly when in that time frame the skeet-shooting range became an established business, if it did at all. Belsterling said he had receipts and "grand opening" posters proving it was operational as of Aug. 23, well before the revised zoning ordinance went into effect Sept. 22. The township said that when it checked out the complaints in October, the range did not have set hours or fees.
The township ordered Belsterling to close the range, and he appealed to the zoning hearing board. It ruled against him in May 2003. He appealed to Beaver County Common Pleas Court, which, in March 2004, upheld the zoning hearing board.
Belsterling then appealed to every available level of the state courts, leading up to last month's ruling.
He said his willingness to go that far was partly from a feeling that he was affronted by his neighbors.
"The one neighbor came up to me and said, 'We don't like it. Shut it down,' " he said. "It's kind of like throwing a handful of slop in your face."
Belsterling said that, if neighbors had been nicer and more willing to compromise, he would have been willing to work something out.
"If they'd said, 'Could you limit it to two days a week?' I would have considered it," he said.
Beyond that feeling, though, Belsterling sees it as a matter of principle, of his right to pursue normal and reasonable activities on his property.
"It's like telling a farmer he can't grow corn, he can only grow grass," he said. "I think if you're paying the taxes, you should be able to do what you want with your land, within reason, of course."
He said that because "within reason" apparently includes raising pigs, that's what he'll do, though the pigs he bought Sept. 1 won't be delivered until the spring.
Asked how many he bought, he said simply, "Enough."
Belsterling still maintains that the shooting range was a less obtrusive use of the farm. He has added some property over the years and now has 330 acres. He raises cattle on most of it.
He said he took decibel readings and that the noise at the property line was far less than that produced by a riding lawnmower or pickup truck.
That's something Goehring would not necessarily dispute. He lives two houses away from Belsterling and said he never had a problem with the noise.
"The skeet range must face the opposite direction," he said, "because it never bothered me."
Goehring said the township was taking part in a state effort to let farmers join Agricultural Security Areas, essentially selling the state the development rights to their land and, in exchange, getting certain protections against "whiny neighbors" complaining about normal farm activities.
Bottom line for Goehring, though, is that a skeet-shooting business is not a normal farm activity and is not allowed under the ordinance, and the ordinance is for the benefit of all.
"I can understand why that rubs him the wrong way," he said of Belsterling. "I feel bad for him. But that's the ordinance."
(Brian David can be reached at [email protected] or at 724-375-6816.)
Source: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05254/568101.stm
My comment: BWAHAHAHAHA! Those neighbors are going to regret this the first time the wind blows their way.
. Sounds like a fun thing to do from sun up to sundown.....
