After eight hearings, the County Planning Commission approved the agricultural enterprise ordinance which will dictate uses for properties wanting to add campgrounds, farm stays, special events and tours.
The ordinance still has to go to the Board of Supervisors for final approval.
On Wednesday, commissioners and members of the public agreed that it was time to move the project along.
“Other counties are way ahead of us on this,” Commissioner Laura Bridley said. “We are behind the curve and I don’t want that to be another reason Santa Barbara County falls behind in its welcoming and maintenance of the agriculture success story.”
Commissioner Roy Reed said the goal isn’t to achieve perfection.
“If that was our goal we would be here until we were long gone and we’d be handing it off to a new board of younger people,” Reed said. “On the other hand I think we have thus far arrived at a program with great utility and potentially great benefit.”
At the last hearing on July 24, commissioners John Parke and Reed proposed overlays that would exclude certain properties — like large-scale row crop agricultural land — from having campgrounds, farm stays and other recreational activities under the ordinance.
The commission was previously considering a 1,000-foot setback from crops for recreational activities allowed in the ordinance, but the idea was unpopular among landowners and would have made many of them unable to use the ordinance.
The commission approved three overlay areas, one over West Santa Maria Valley, one over East Santa Maria Valley, and another in the Lompoc Valley.
Parke and Reed had originally proposed an overlay over the Highway 135 corridor but have since decided not to include it, because a large part of the area belongs to a property owner who wanted to take advantage of the agricultural enterprise ordinance.
An interactive map with the overlays can be seen here.
The commission did discuss a permit pathway for properties in the overlay to have some allowed uses in the agricultural enterprise ordinance.
Aquaponics, small scale agriculture processing, farm stands, horseback riding, hunting, and incidental food service at wineries are allowed for properties within the overlay.
If a property owner within the overlay wants to have a campground, farm stay, fishing operation, process and sell firewood, have small scale lumber processing and milling, or host a small scale special event, they would need to go to the Zoning Administrator to get a minor conditional use permit.
Composting on overlay properties will require a major conditional use permit from the Planning Commission.
Setbacks and campgrounds were other topics of discussion at previous meetings.
For properties outside the overlays, the commission approved a 100-foot general setback between crops and all uses, a 400-foot setback from adjacent residences, and a 200-foot setback from food crops, orchards, and vineyards.
Properties of 100 acres or fewer can have 15 campsites. Initially the commission considered fewer sites for smaller properties. Campgrounds created with the agricultural enterprise ordinance will have quiet hours starting at 9 p.m.
