Tag: zoning

Female Napa Valley winery owner slapped with $4M in fines for putting on wine tasting and yoga classes on 8-acre land

A California winery owner has been slapped with nearly $4 million in fines after losing a court battle over hosting wine tastings and events on her eight-acre property.

Lindsay Hoopes, owner of Hoopes Vineyard in the rolling hills of Napa Valley, has been embroiled in a years-long court battle with Napa County.

The county filed suit in 2022, accusing Hoopes of creating a ‘public nuisance’ by hosting yoga classes and wine tastings, and selling items like greeting cards and hand sanitizer while failing to obtain a permit for a 120-sq-ft chicken coop. 

The legal fight hinges on whether small wineries established before 1990 – prior to new regulations – can host tastings without a permit. Central to the dispute is the ‘Small Winery Exemption,’ which the county argues does not allow such events. 

Hoopes has repeatedly challenged the county’s stance, continuing to allow the public onto her property despite what officials describe as ongoing ‘illegal activities,’ including farm animals on-site and unpermitted string lights. 

In the latest blow to Hoopes, a judge ruled against her, ordering an end to all on-site tastings, public events and sales on her vineyard, according to CBS News.

‘This is the most inhumane thing I’ve ever seen,’ Hoopes told the outlet in response to the ruling.

‘Drinking wine at a winery should never, ever, ever force a business owner/mother to essentially defend her livelihood or protect her children,’ she added. ‘I mean, the whole thing has been so grossly abusive and punitive.’

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Politicians Think More Zoning Laws Will Fix Housing Prices, But The Data Says Otherwise 

he U.S. Senate has passed a bipartisan bill, titled “The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act,” aiming to make housing more affordable. However, similar to other misleading pieces of legislation — such as the infamous Inflation Reduction Act, which is actually a massive climate-change bill that worsened inflation — this new housing bill may have the opposite effect on housing affordability than what its title suggests.

The newly introduced bill is co-led by Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Tim Scott, R-S.C. A key assumption of the bill is that restrictive single-family zoning is a primary cause of limited housing supply and high housing costs. The legislation includes key policy proposals that Warren has previously championed, such as offering grants to state and local governments that reform exclusionary zoning rules and permit more high-density housing in areas previously designated for single-family homes.

However, the bill’s sponsors overlook empirical evidence from left-wing cities and states, such as Minneapolis, Oregon, and California, where Democrat legislatures have already effectively eliminated exclusive single-family zoning in favor of higher-density housing — the kind of reform for which Warren advocates.

A 2023 study found that upzoning resulted in an insignificant housing supply increase of less than one percent within three to nine years, offering no real improvements for low- to moderate-income renters. 

Research about Minneapolis’ zoning reform shows upzoning fueled speculation, driving single-family home prices 3-5 percent higher than in comparable border areas. Similarly, post-single-family home zoning ban analyses show median home values in Oregon continued rising sharply, reaching $509,539 in May 2022, representing an increase of 19.7 percent from a year prior.

Upzoning reforms for which Warren and other Democrats advocate have clearly proven to be ineffective in achieving their goals. Instead of making housing more affordable, these policies have centralized zoning authority, eroding local control and undermining property rights.

Yet despite upzoning reform’s track record, Democrats persist in implementing these same misguided strategies across the nation. In Colorado, the Democrat legislature and Gov. Jared Polis pushed through significant new laws in 2024 aimed at increasing high-density housing and overriding local zoning decisions. HB 24-1313 forces minimum housing densities near transit in select communities, while HB 24-1304 eliminates parking requirements for multifamily developments in urban areas. Additionally, an executive order ties discretionary grants to adherence to these state housing mandates, further diminishing local autonomy.

These new state laws sparked immediate backlash. Cities including Greenwood Village, Aurora, Arvada, Westminster, Glendale, and Lafayette sued, arguing the laws violate home-rule protections in the Colorado Constitution.

In other Colorado municipalities such as Littleton, Telluride, Estes Park, and Greeley, voters overwhelmingly rejected their leftist city councils’ attempt to revise their zoning codes to permit more “middle housing” options — such as duplexes, triplexes, and townhomes — within previously single-family zones. Similarly, in California, residents of San Francisco ousted a local politician from office in a 2025 recall election for his support of upzoning reform.

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Local Tyrants: How Property Rights of Farmers in Battleground States are Victimized by Zoning Boards

A new report spearheaded by the Private Property Rights Institute (PPRI) has profiled different farmers in the battleground states of Michigan and Pennsylvania, highlighting the stories of how zoning boards have prevented them from properly utilizing their land to stay afloat.

In an age of Biden-driven inflation, domination of the farming industry by ruthless Big Ag and a myriad of other economic challenges, these farmers have also had to deal with the mandates of zoning boards restricting their ability to develop their land as they see fit.

Bob Wackernagel, a third-generation farmer in Michigan, has watched community-based farming slowly die off in Michigan. At the age of 60, he reports being the youngest farmer in his area. To make ends meet and preserve his family’s way of life, Wackernagel leased approximately 100 acres for solar development upon the most arid portion of his farmland. As a result, he has received attacks from township officials.

“I use the ground that returns me the least investment back on my crops … I’ve replanted two or three times a season on that land, because of poor soil quality… They act like it’s their land … They don’t have to pay the property taxes; they don’t have to farm it,” Wackernagel said.

Dwight Ely, a seventh-generation farmer from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, can trace his roots on his family’s land back to the 1800s. He raises livestock and operates a meat-processing business with massive and growing energy costs. Ely invested in solar panels years ago to help bring down his energy bill to manageable levels.

“Sure, it helped this generation for sure … big savings… absolutely, it helped to continue the generational thing for sure,” he said. “We pay that thing off, and it’s been nothing but awesome … It’s just been a gift that keeps giving,” Ely said.

Ely worked with neighbors to add fencing, plant trees and make sure his solar panels did not cause blight within his rural area. However, his hopes to expand his solar fleet as part of a business expansion plan that would have provided value to the community were stymied by the local zoning board.

“Some little guy sitting up at a little office at the township building says… he wants to make it hard. That’s the ridiculous part,” he said.

Two local officials in Pennsylvania and Michigan – Leoni Township Supervisor Howard Linnabary and Bradford County Commissioner Doug McLinko – believe that misinformation and a poor understanding of property rights are causing barriers that result in bureaucratic pushback against solar panels.

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Portland to Issue Land Use Violation Notice Against ICE Building

The City of Portland announced it will issue a land use violation notice against an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) building as it accused the agency of holding detainees in a manner that does not “comply with the conditions of the site’s land use approval.”

“Federal government records from a 10-month period show more than two dozen detention policy violations of the facility’s land use conditions of approval with the city, which does not allow detainees to be kept overnight or held for more than 12 hours,” Oregon’s largest city said in a statement on Wednesday.

The city said it will issue the notice, which also references what it calls a second violation regarding boarded-up windows, on Thursday.

Landowners have 30 days after receiving a notice of violation to correct the issue. A fine can be issued if there is “substantial evidence of violation,” the city said Wednesday. The city’s permitting bureau can also initiate a “reconsideration” of a land use approval by scheduling a hearing at least 60 days after a notice is given, the city said. Decisions from the hearings officer can be appealed to the City Council.

ICE and the Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to Epoch Times’ requests for comment Thursday.

The ICE building has been the site of nightly protests and clashes, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said earlier this summer. Criminals and “antifa-affiliated groups” have attempted to dox, or reveal, the personal information of ICE officers in the city and in Oregon, the department said.

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Colorado’s Zoning Tyrants Go To War Against A Christian-Owned French Bakery

Acherished French bakery in Jefferson County, Colorado, is facing potential closure because of the county’s harsh enforcement of exclusionary zoning regulations. This situation underscores how overly restrictive regulations create unnecessary hurdles that stifle entrepreneurship, especially when the local economy is struggling.

Lookout Mountain, Colorado, is celebrated for its breathtaking views, luxurious homes, and as the final resting place of Buffalo Bill. Just 12 miles from downtown Denver, it has become a must-visit destination for hikers, mountain bikers, and tourists from all over the globe.

This charming mountain community has long grappled with one significant drawback: the lack of a quality café. For many years, residents and visitors have had to travel to the nearby city of Golden for a decent cup of coffee or tasty pastries. So both locals and tourists were thrilled when a French bakery, Et Voilà!, opened less than half a mile from Buffalo Bill’s Museum and Grave.

Et Voilà! — meaning “Here you go” in French — is run by a passionate trio of French immigrants: husband-and-wife team Eric and Rachel Dufour, along with Rachel’s sister, Ruth. After leaving a successful career as an economist, Ruth pursued her passion for baking at renowned chef Olivier Bajard’s pastry school. The Dufours want to share their love for authentic French cuisine with the Lookout Mountain community, creating a welcoming space for locals and visitors. They also count on the bakery’s financial success to support their nonprofit, Serving Alongside Ministry (SAM), which provides counseling services for Christian organizations and leaders globally.

To turn their dream into reality, the Dufours sold their home and put the proceeds into starting a bakery business. They rent an old storage building on Lookout Mountain Road and spent almost a year transforming it into a clean and inviting space.

With American and French flags at the entrance, the bakery feels like a community hub. One side features cozy café seating, while the other has a long picnic table for gatherings. The walls showcase vibrant posters of famous Paris landmarks, and shelves with board games invite customers to relax and connect.

Like many immigrant entrepreneurs, the Dufours work tirelessly. Their bakery is open six days a week, with Ruth starting her baking at 1 a.m. every day. Eric and Rachel typically work on their nonprofit from 4 to 6 a.m. before joining Ruth to prepare for the bakery’s 7 a.m. opening.

The Dufours recognized from the beginning that living within walking distance of the bakery is crucial for the success of their business adventure. Winters in Lookout Mountain are long and harsh, and frequent snowstorms can easily dump several feet of snow and block the road. Operating their business during these long winters would be nearly impossible if they lived further away.

The Dufours found a strategic temporary solution, ordering two custom-made trailer coaches from Canada and placing them behind their bakery shop. These trailer coaches serve as their living space, home office, and Ruth’s test kitchen. The solar panels attached to the trailer coaches even became the emergency energy source to keep the bakery running during a recent power outage. Always respectful of the surroundings, the Dufours ensured the trailer coaches’ exterior and design matched the bakery’s, while tastefully blending in with the natural environment.

The Dufours plan to live in the trailers for the first two years while saving to buy a home nearby. While the plan is ambitious — given that the median house price in the neighborhood is around $1.4 million — the Dufours are driven by the promise of the American dream. Importantly, they communicated their plan to their realtors and landlord before signing the lease and received unanimous support.

Unfortunately, an anonymous zoning complaint in September last year claimed that the area where the Dufours’ trailers are located is not zoned for residential use. As a result, Jefferson County’s zoning inspectors have ordered the Dufours to remove the trailer coaches.

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NIMBY Lawsuit Accidentally Abolishes City’s Entire Zoning Code

The comedy of errors unfolding from a lawsuit challenging Charlottesville, Virginia’s new zoning code took a surprisingly libertarian turn last week when a judge’s ruling ended up voiding all the city’s zoning regulations.

The lawsuit, filed by neighborhood activists in early 2024, challenges the Charlottesville City Council’s decision to allow apartment buildings in more areas of the city and “middle housing” development in formerly single-family-only neighborhoods.

The plaintiffs, who are alleging the city failed to coordinate the zoning changes with infrastructure planning, appeared to score a total victory last week when Charlottesville Circuit Court Judge Claude Worrell ruled that, because the city missed a key filing deadline, the new code had to be scrapped.

But now, local media outlets are reporting a surprising twist. Charlottesville had to repeal its old zoning code before passing the new one. With the new code now voided and the old one off the books, the city officially now has no zoning code to speak of.

In other words, a NIMBY lawsuit challenging a slightly more liberal zoning code has resulted in complete zoning abolition.

Critics of zoning like to point out that many of the things people think they like about zoning—rules regulating the health and safety of new buildings, stormwater runoff, etc.—actually have nothing to do with zoning at all.

Charlottesville’s accidental zoning abolition is a great illustration of that point.

As Charlottesville Tomorrow reports, building codes and other related regulations remain on the books. But the zoning code’s rules about where apartments can be built, how tall they can be, how many units they can include, etc. are gone.

​​”If there’s no ordinance, then we don’t even need site plans,” Justin Shimp, the head of a local engineering firm, told Charlottesville Tomorrow. “You would simply say, I want to build an apartment building, and I would turn the building permit into the building department, and if it met the [state] building code, they would approve it, and you would build an apartment building.”

Unfortunately for zoning critics, the city is doing what it can to prevent a blossoming of new unzoned development while it scrambles to reinstitute a zoning code.

City planning staff told Charlottesville Tomorrow that they will delay any processing of building applications that “involve zoning” until they receive “further legal and procedural clarity.”

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California Boat Owner Ordered by City to Fence-In His Boat—So He Trolls Them With Hilarious Mural

A boat owner in Seaside, California, has deployed art in an uproarious and novel way to protest a city ordinance dictating to him how he must park his boat on his property.

Illusionistically painted on the new white fence he was forced to build on the driveway he had to have paved is the visage of his proud vessel’s prow and trailer—literally inches away from the actual ones parked behind, now fenced off from view from the street in front of his house.

Etienne Constable is the cheeky resident responsible for sticking it to the city for their “silly laws” with his First Amendment-inspired fence mural, though a local artist was hired to tackle the task of painting.

In July 2023, city officials had ordered Mr. Constable to build a proper driveway and a 6-foot-tall fence for the boat, which had until recently been stowed on a dirt patch in his yard, Fox News reported. The decree was on pain of paying a $100 fine for non-compliance, which Mr. Constable ended up not having to shell out.

“There’s some logic to the law about not having decrepit vehicles,” he told the outlet. “And I figured, ‘This is not unsightly.’ I don’t know why they would threaten me that way.”

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Judge Rules in Favor of New Hampshire Bakery in Fight Over Donut Mural

A New Hampshire bakery has won a crucial victory in its fight to preserve a mural of donuts and other baked goods above its storefront. While town officials have attempted to force the bakery to remove the mural, citing zoning regulations, a federal court ruled on Monday that the city cannot enforce its sign rules against the bakery.

In 2022, Sean Young, the owner of Leavitt’s Country Bakery, a popular bakery in Conway, New Hampshire, collaborated with a local high school art class to paint a mural for the bakery’s storefront. The students’ mural depicted baked goods forming the shape of a mountain range, with a multicolored sunrise in the background. Initially, the mural didn’t cause any controversy—and it was even covered positively by local media. However, about a week after being installed, Conway’s Code Enforcement Officer Jeremy Gibbs told Young that the mural violated town zoning rules.

According to the town, the mural violated local laws that regulate signs. Because the mural depicted baked goods—which the bakery obviously sells—it was deemed a “sign,” not a mural, and signs are subject to rules limiting their size. While the town’s rules define a sign incredibly broadly, in practice, the town only enforces its sign regulations on speech it perceives as commercial in nature. If Leavitt’s Country Bakery had erected a mural of just a sunrise, for example, the town would have no problem with it, even though the rules on the books would apply to both. “Imposing different burdens on speech depending on who is speaking and what is being said is content based and speaker based restriction on free speech,” reads a 2023 complaint from the Institute for Justice, a public interest law group, which represented the bakery in its lawsuit against Conway.

On Monday, a judge agreed. While the judge noted that the town’s sign rules, as written, don’t necessarily violate the Constitution, the selective nature of the town’s enforcement does. “The court rules only that Conway’s application of its sign code, and specifically its enforcement of the sign code to the Leavitt’s sign in the particular manner it employed in this case, does not withstand any level of constitutional scrutiny,” reads a ruling from District Judge Joseph N. Laplante enjoining the town from forcing Young to remove the mural. “Although the display may have violated the sign code because of its size, Gibbs’ determination was based on a rationale with no textual basis in the sign code, which does not distinguish between displays based on content.”

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Trump’s DOJ Files Federal Lawsuit Against Small Idaho Town for Targeting Evangelical Church

President Trump’s Department of Justice has filed a federal lawsuit against the far-left leadership of Troy, Idaho, accusing the city of blatantly targeting a Christian congregation simply for trying to worship.

The lawsuit, United States v. City of Troy, is a blistering rebuke of how local officials weaponized zoning codes to shut down Christ Church, a growing evangelical church based in neighboring Moscow, Idaho.

Trump’s DOJ alleges that city leaders engaged in open discrimination, suppressing the church’s right to assemble — while allowing secular organizations to flourish in the same exact zone.

Christ Church, with a congregation too large for its Moscow area, sought to expand into Troy.

They tried renting a former bank building downtown to host Sunday services — a common sense solution given the building had been vacant for over a year and had ample street parking.

But after just two services, the city attorney sent a cease-and-desist order. The message was clear: Churches are not welcome in downtown Troy.

The church followed the law, applied for a Conditional Use Permit (CUP), and faced nothing short of a hostile inquisition.

City officials opened the floodgates to anti-Christian bigotry during the permit hearing. Opponents called Christ Church “a hate group,” accused it of “grotesque” beliefs, and claimed it would “destroy another Idaho town.”

The council then cited these comments — rooted in religious animus — as part of their decision to deny the church the right to worship.

Under Troy’s zoning code, churches are treated as second-class citizens, requiring a special conditional use permit to operate in the very same downtown district where art galleries, community centers, libraries, and even fraternal organizations are allowed to operate without any permit at all.

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Zoning Regulations Empower Control Freaks—and Bigots

Imagine you’re a member of a religious minority that’s on the receiving end of a lot of hate, and the local zoning board is giving you a hard time over plans to expand your house of worship. Is it regulators being their nitpicky selves? Are the neighbors weaponizing rules to squeeze out the cars and foot traffic that accompany any successful endeavor? Or could it be hostility directed at your faith? Zoning has been used and abused in all these ways, which underlines the need for reform.

Bigotry Through Red Tape

“A proposal to dramatically expand Harvard Chabad’s Banks Street headquarters failed to win approval from the Cambridge Board of Zoning Appeals during a contentious Thursday public hearing,” The Harvard Crimson reported last week. “The rejection leaves the Jewish student organization to revise and clarify the proposal before a follow-up hearing in June.”

Harvard Chabad’s Rabbi Hirschy Zarchi told me that opposition to the group’s expansion has featured many “inappropriate comments” including suggestions that the group is “too visibly Jewish.” Other criticism, he says, is more “classic NIMBY,” though it sometimes touches on the nature of Chabad in the former of objections to the presence of security often required by Jewish organizations after October 7.

Zarchi and company aren’t alone. Just last month, the U.S. Department of Justice warned officials in Hawaii about their efforts to block operation of a Chabad house. The plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Hawaii County “have established a likelihood of success on the merits” of their claims of bias, according to Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general of the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

Part of the problem in Cambridge could be general opposition to houses of worship, which draw crowds but don’t generate much money for revenue-hungry governments.

“Many land-use disputes aren’t about explicit bigotry,” Emma Green wrote in 2017 for The Atlantic. “They arise from concerns about noise, lost property taxes, and Sunday-morning traffic jams. The effect is largely the same, and can be just as devastating as outright hatred: A religious community is dragged into a lengthy, and costly, dispute with a city or town.”

Use of zoning laws to block churches, synagogues, and mosques has been such a problem that it inspired the passage of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act in 2000. “Zoning codes and landmarking laws may illegally exclude religious assemblies in places where they permit theaters, meeting halls, and other places where large groups of people assemble for secular purposes,” notes the Department of Justice in a commentary on the law. That the effort wasn’t fully successful is apparent from the fact that the Justice Department is still cautioning jurisdictions over land use regulations that, as in Hawaii, explicitly discriminate against religious groups.

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