Residents of a Pulaski County neighborhood are at loggerheads over an events center proposed for the Wye Mountain area.
Attorneys for Wesley Snodgrass filed a lawsuit against Pulaski County this week after the county's Planning Board rejected his request to construct a wedding and events venue at the center of 90 acres he owns along Arkansas 113.
Snodgrass purchased the land last spring with the intention of building a 4,000-square-foot, Tuscany-style chateau beside an existing 1,600-square-foot log cabin. It was to be called the Ever After Events Center, and by next year he was hoping to be making weekly bookings for weddings, corporate retreats or church events.
But those plans were thrown into uncertainty last month when the Pulaski County Planning Board voted to reject Snodgrass' request at the urging of numerous surrounding residents.
Members of the opposition group signed and submitted a petition to the board expressing multiple concerns with the proposed property.
Two of those names included U.S. District Judge Billy Roy Wilson and his wife, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Cathleen Compton, who have owned 15 acres next to the Snodgrass' 90 acres for 25 years. To help lead their opposition, they hired real estate and property-rights attorney Stephen Giles.
The group argued that an event center would be incompatible with the surrounding properties; that weddings and other events could create disruptive noise and light pollution; that the project posed potential environmental hazards to the Lake Maumelle watershed; and that added traffic on the serpentine Arkansas 113 would exacerbate the road's precariousness.
Snodgrass' appeal of the board's decision, filed in Pulaski County Circuit Court by attorney Kent Walker, says the concerns raised by community members during the board meeting were "exaggerated," and it countered each of their individual claims.
"The proposed use would have no detrimental effects in regards to water quality. ... Any increase in traffic will [not] be significantly noticeable ... [and] there is no evidence to substantiate a finding that the proposed facility would adversely affect neighboring properties," the suit read. "To the contrary, it would contribute economically to the community and support its growth and value."
After learning more about the proposal, some of the area's residents are not opposed to Snodgrass' idea.
"Now that more of the property owners around that location have been informed of what is going on, [Snodgrass] is gaining support drastically," said Jamie Fagan, a Wye Mountain resident who owns property on the Lake Maumelle watershed.
She and 30 to 40 residents are backing Snodgrass in a defence of property rights on the watershed.
Just three years ago, Fagan and her neighbors were consumed in a years-long fight over property rights as the county was rewriting its zoning code to protect the water quality for Lake Maumelle, the primary water supply for hundreds of thousands of central Arkansas residents.
Residents launched a concerted effort to ensure that any new zoning code would not erode their property rights, and in 2014 the county adopted the Lake Maumelle Watershed Zoning Code.
Snodgrass' zoning application is the first zoning action since the adoption of that code.
"We don't live in Chenal, we don't have a [property-rights association]. We moved to the county for that very reason. We can shoot our guns off in our yards, we have those rights," Fagan said. "For a small group of people, led by two judges, to be able to deny something that's nothing but a beautiful Tuscany chateau ... I don't think that's right."
Snodgrass and his new supporters plan to hold a gathering in the coming weeks to clarify any rumors or misinformation regarding the events center, Fagan said.
Such a meeting would be a sharp contrast to one held last month.
Just weeks before the Planning Board rejected Snodgrass' proposal, Wilson and Compton invited Snodgrass and his wife into their home to discuss the event center plans.
"They had their living room lined up to where all the neighbors are lined up on one side, and they put two stools in front of everybody for my wife and I," Snodgrass said. "For about 45 minutes we answered question after question, concern after concern."
"It was almost like a firing squad," Snodgrass said in a phone interview last month. "The only thing missing was a blindfold and a cigarette."
During last month's Planning Board meeting, Compton objected to that characterization. She told the board that during the meeting Snodgrass and his wife were uncompromising in their plans, preferring to cater to the needs of their clients over the requests of their neighbors.
"This event center is totally client-driven, and if you have the money to have your event here, then all the rules be damned, because they're going to cater to their client," Compton said.
"One question that was put to one of the Snodgrasses that night was 'Would you allow a bachelor party out there?' And the answer was yes," she said. "So what we're hearing today and what we heard at my house is divergent at best. A bachelor party to me says, 'Ain't nobody going to sleep tonight.'"
According to Snodgrass, the property would not be selling any alcohol and would have a "bring your own" policy, which, according to state Alcoholic Beverage Control, would not fall under the agency's jurisdiction and would not require a permit.
"There's not going to be alcohol sold here, there's not going to be strippers or anything of ill-repute," Snodgrass said in an interview.
The appeal suit was placed in Circuit Judge Wendell Griffen's court. Pulaski County, the county Planning Board and board Chairman Neil Bryan are all named as defendants. The plaintiffs requested a trial by jury.
Metro on 05/26/2017