Hunting lodge aiming for Martin County permits
June 25th, 2009 by TCPalm.comINDIANTOWN — For years, the owners of J&R Outfitters ran a hunting lodge featuring exotic game such as Asian water buffalo, Nilgai antelope and Pere David deer thinking they had all the required Martin County permits.
But several code violations were discovered at J&R Outfitters last fall after the opening of a shooting range that outraged nearby homeowners with incessant gunfire.
Now Bill Richey and Joe O’Bannon are aiming to keep their hunting lodge open by jumping through all the regulatory hoops that apply to their business at 7600 S.W. Fox Brown Road.
“We never dreamed that what we were doing was illegal and we never tried to get away with anything,” said Richey, a former state prosecutor. “We have been no secret in Martin County. We have been here for 20 years.”
“We have had big parties in which county employees, county commissioners, any number of people have been on our property, stood on our front porch and saw that we had a hunting operation,” Richey said during a Martin County Local Planning Agency meeting. “We are good neighbors.”
The trouble started last year when South Florida Shooting Sports leased and upgraded the shooting ranges, Richey said. The company had agreed to obtain all the required county permits, but it turned out they had not.
By September, neighboring homeowners started complaining to the Martin County commissioners about daylong barrages of gunfire disturbing the peace and quiet of the rural enclave.
Martin County code enforcement officials cited the property owners in October for operating a hunting camp and a shooting range without the required zoning, site plan, building permits and occupational licenses.
J&R Outfitters didn’t realize it needed to upgrade its permits and obtain site plan approval as the hunting camp evolved from a private club into a publicly advertised business, said Morris Crady, a land planner working for J&R. And they didn’t realize there was a zoning conflict.
J&R Outfitters initially asked to change the zoning of its 2,825-acre property to a category that allows a hunting camp and a shooting range, but several homeowners objected during a Local Planning Agency meeting in April.
“The hunting camp like it is I can live with that,” said Cheryl Baker, who moved into her Fox Brown Road home in 1980. “But I fear the zoning change will open a Pandora’s box.”
In light of the neighborhood opposition to rezoning, J&R Outfitters officials asked Martin County to add hunting camps to the list of permitted uses in Agriculture-2 zoning category, which includes their property.
That would set the stage for J&R Outfitters to obtain the site plan approval and permits needed to operate the hunting camp, said county Growth Management Director Nicki van Vonno. Since shooting ranges are not permitted by the A-2 zoning, the neighbors would not have to worry about another shooting range opening on the property.
The zoning proposal is expected to be presented to the Local Planning Agency in August and the County Commission in September, van Vonno said.
J&R Outfitters hopes to complete the approval and permitting process before the end of the year, Crady said.
Some of the neighbors remain ambivalent about adding hunting camp to the list of uses permitted in the A-2 zone, even if it means they won’t have to worry about the noise from a shooting range.
“It’s too early for us to say if we’re going to fight it,” said Elisa Ackerly, a Fox Brown Road homeowner about the hunting lodge. “It is the lesser of two evils for us. We could not live with the shooting range. It was just way too noisy.”
J&R OUTFITTERS SITE PLAN
J&R Outfitters is trying to comply with Martin County’s codes so it can keep operating a hunting camp at 7600 S.W. Fox Brown Road near Indiantown. That includes obtaining site plan approval for the following existing buildings on a 346-acre portion of its 2,825-acre property:
Lodge: 7,230 square feet
Mobile home: 1,445 square feet
Office trailer: 2,048 square feet
Barns: 11,220 square feet
Kennel: 4,225 square feet
Gross floor area: 26,168 square feet
Other site plan details:
Total site area: 346 acres
Upland preserve: 13.4 acres
Wetland area: 22.2 acres
Wetland buffer area: 12.9 acres
Wetland buffer compensation: 0.5 acre
J&R OUTFITTERS EXOTIC BIG GAME HUNTS
Some of the animals available for hunting include:
Antelope: Nilgai, black buck and Eland
Barasingha
Water buffalo
Deer: Axis, fallow, red, sika, Pere David
Goats: Angora and catalina
Ibex
Sheep: Barbados, Corsican, dall, merino, mouflon, Hawaiian black
By George Andreassi, TCPalm.com
Tags: Buffalo, camp, club, codes, commissioners, deer, fall, fight, Florida, fox, gun, guns, hunt, Indiantown, mobile, noise, property, roads, saw, shooting, trailer, violations, violators, water, zoning
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June 25th, 2009 at 10:51 am
A hunting camp where animals are brought in to be hunted is nothing but animal cruelty.
If those animals were meant to be hunted they would be in Florida’s wildlife population.
I think this business should be shut down and locked up tight.
This is totally for sport and should NOT BE PERMITTED !
June 25th, 2009 at 11:14 pm
THIS HUNTING OUTFIT HAS BEEN DOING THIS FOR YEARS JUST LIKE OTHERS AROUND THEM. THE ANIMALS THAT ARE BEING HUNTED ARE NOT ENDANGERED NOR ARE THEY ANY HARM TO THE LOCAL RESIDENTS.
THERE IS ONLY A FEW PLACES THAT PEOPLE CAN GO AND DISCHARGE FIREARMS THAT ARE LEGAL THESE DAYS. I AM A FLORIDA NATIVE TO PALM BEACH COUNTY AND OVER THE YEARS ALL THE LAND THAT WE WERE ABLE TO SHOOT ON IS GONE. I HAVE BEEN TO THIS J&R OUTFITTERS BEFORE AND THINK THINK THIS PLACE IS GREAT. IT IS PEOPLE LIKE CHANNA WHO HAVE NEVER SHOT A GUN NOR LIKE THE GREAT SPORT OF HUNTING THAT BRING PLACES LIKE THIS ESTABLISHMENT DOWN…
June 28th, 2009 at 4:26 pm
It’s probably like the place dickless cheney hunts birds who have had their wings clipped so they can’t fly away.
A little valium in the drinking water will slow them down- some sport.
November 3rd, 2009 at 8:15 pm
I agree with Channa 100%!!!!
what kind of person can get pleasure and consider it FUN to kill a defenseless animal??? To watch them die in pain in front of their eyes. Please help us understand how this is fun? Do you have no compassion? Animals feel pain just like you do. You want guns, have guns, go to shooting range even eat meat if you choose. But why do we need barbaric hunting camps like this??? Can’t you hunters do others things for fun? Just an idea. Why don’t you spend just one day volunteering in a Humane Society, maybe after that you might find that heart of yours.
January 9th, 2010 at 3:55 am
I like your blog. I have been reading a lot here. Thank you for all your work!