Following are some of the articles published by The Observer for the month of September in recent years. These articles, gathered from various publications and editorials, are noteworthy for residents in that they remind us of where we’ve been as a community.
Appellate court sides with Barrington Hills on horse boarding issue – 2011
The village of Barrington Hills has the authority to regulate horse boarding on residential property, according to a recent appellate court ruling that could end at least one part of three-year legal fight over a local horse farm.
Barrington Hills residents Cathleen and Benjamin LeCompte sued the village last year, challenging its jurisdiction over their Oakwood Farms, located on a residentially zoned 130-acre site along Bateman Road.
The couple appeared before Barrington Hills’ zoning board of appeals in August 2008, arguing that the operation — which features a barn large enough to house 60 horses and 110 acres of riding space — is an agricultural use outside the village’s ability to regulate. The zoning board disagreed, and a Cook County court later sided with the village.
Read the full Daily Herald article here.
Zoning Board approves horse boarding text amendment – 2014
The Zoning Board of Appeals met last Thursday evening to discuss, and possibly recommend, one of four horse boarding text amendment proposals that they had heard testimony and public comment on during previous meetings. By the end of the meeting, the board narrowly approved a text amendment, but it was not one of the four that had been previously been heard by the board and had never before been made available to residents for comment.
Read the original Observer commentary with 33 reader comments here.
Barrington Hills board debates horse boarding plan – 2014
Barrington Hills trustees sent a controversial horse boarding plan back to the village’s zoning board Monday night for clarification on 11 points before they take a vote.
The board’s action came after more than 2½ hours of public comment and board discussion before a large group of residents in the Countryside Elementary School gymnasium.
Critics of the plan, which would allow landowners to board three horses for each acre of property, said it did not receive the proper scrutiny of the zoning board.
Revisit one of the most commented stories ever here.
So why is the Village being sued (again) over commercial horse boarding? – 2015
The simple answer to the question of why we’re being sued is that some elected and appointed Village officials put us in this position last December when they approved a commercial horse boarding amendment to our code which clearly favored one party over another in a private lawsuit that did not involve our Village.
In order to fully understand the rationale behind the suit, residents need to understand the history of one commercial horse boarding operation in the Village that has, in our opinion, consumed an inordinate amount of time, energy and taxpayers’ money for too long now.
Read or revisit the full Observer editorial with reader comments here.
Commercial horse boarding amendment commentary – 2015
When you get right down to brass tacks, the seven of you are called upon to decide whether 5-acre residential zoning standards will be the “only consideration” concerning “development” and “use” on parcels of land in Barrington Hills zoned R-1 (5 acres) or will these residential zoning standards take a “back seat” to commercial enterprise when this enterprise takes the form of “horse boarding for a fee”; on any scale; large or small?
Read this guest essay from a year ago here.
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Editor’s note: Since 2009, 223 articles have been categorized with a reference tag of “Commercial Horse Boarding” including this one in The Observer.
By any measure, this is far too many, and it is our fervent hope the Zoning Board of Appeals and the Board of Trustees can finally come to an agreement in the near future on regulations for horse boarding that all residents can live with for decades to come. This semi-annual (and sometimes annual) unnecessary dispute between residents is a senseless waste of time and energy, and only serves to continue to divide our community.
-The Observer
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