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A town attorney told a packed selectmen's meeting last night that Wildstar Farm generally has a right to operate in the Sandy Valley Road neighborhood thanks to a state agricultural exemption.
But until Wildstar Farm applies for a building permit, the town cannot determine whether it would be "permitted or allowable" locally under the agricultural exemption, Town Counsel Tom McCusker added.
Meantime, selectmen Chairman Patrick Ahearn urged the farm's owners and residents who have mobilized against the project to find a "middle ground."
McCusker said "the keeping of horses as a commercial enterprise" is one agricultural use that towns cannot regulate.
"So a commercial enterprise of this nature under the statute is allowed in a residential area because the state has said towns can't regulate it," McCusker said as about 25 people filled the selectmen's meeting room for a 40-minute discussion on the farm, a 22-stall horse barn proposed for the end of Sandy Valley Road.
Apart from the agricultural exemption, the project would still need to meet other Westwood laws and regulations, such as those of the Planning Board and Board of Health.
Wildstar Farm owners Polly Kornblith and Michael Newman and their attorney, Alan Schlesinger, attended last night's meeting, as did project opponent Craig Foscaldo and his group's lawyer, Luke Legere.
Kornblith and Newman have planned an elite dressage barn on their 16-acre property at 401 Sandy Valley Road that will include a 20-meter-by-60-meter indoor arena and a similarly sized outdoor riding ring.
Legere summarized the concerns of a large number of Sandy Valley Road residents, including the scale of the project, and the farm's proximity to the town-owned Lowell Woods. That land is "being advertised as sort of an amenity to this project," he said, but residents object to having the property used by a commercial horseback riding facility because of conflicts that could create on the trails.
Ahearn said the Conservation Commission has the authority to determine how Lowell Woods should be used. The commission is scheduled to meet on Wildstar Farm tomorrow night.
Schlesinger said Wildstar riders would infrequently, at most, take their horses for a walk in Lowell Woods.
Far Reach Road resident Dana Pope pointed to Sage Farm on the Westwood-Dover border as an example of a "meticulously maintained" horse facility that has "a phenomenal manure management system" and abuts wetlands, as Wildstar would.
A town attorney told a packed selectmen's meeting last night that Wildstar Farm generally has a right to operate in the Sandy Valley Road neighborhood thanks to a state agricultural exemption.
But until Wildstar Farm applies for a building permit, the town cannot determine whether it would be "permitted or allowable" locally under the agricultural exemption, Town Counsel Tom McCusker added.
Meantime, selectmen Chairman Patrick Ahearn urged the farm's owners and residents who have mobilized against the project to find a "middle ground."
McCusker said "the keeping of horses as a commercial enterprise" is one agricultural use that towns cannot regulate.
"So a commercial enterprise of this nature under the statute is allowed in a residential area because the state has said towns can't regulate it," McCusker said as about 25 people filled the selectmen's meeting room for a 40-minute discussion on the farm, a 22-stall horse barn proposed for the end of Sandy Valley Road.
Apart from the agricultural exemption, the project would still need to meet other Westwood laws and regulations, such as those of the Planning Board and Board of Health.
Wildstar Farm owners Polly Kornblith and Michael Newman and their attorney, Alan Schlesinger, attended last night's meeting, as did project opponent Craig Foscaldo and his group's lawyer, Luke Legere.
Kornblith and Newman have planned an elite dressage barn on their 16-acre property at 401 Sandy Valley Road that will include a 20-meter-by-60-meter indoor arena and a similarly sized outdoor riding ring.
Legere summarized the concerns of a large number of Sandy Valley Road residents, including the scale of the project, and the farm's proximity to the town-owned Lowell Woods. That land is "being advertised as sort of an amenity to this project," he said, but residents object to having the property used by a commercial horseback riding facility because of conflicts that could create on the trails.
Ahearn said the Conservation Commission has the authority to determine how Lowell Woods should be used. The commission is scheduled to meet on Wildstar Farm tomorrow night.
Schlesinger said Wildstar riders would infrequently, at most, take their horses for a walk in Lowell Woods.
Far Reach Road resident Dana Pope pointed to Sage Farm on the Westwood-Dover border as an example of a "meticulously maintained" horse facility that has "a phenomenal manure management system" and abuts wetlands, as Wildstar would.
Pope said Sage Farm keeps about 20 to 25 horses next to the popular Hale Reservation without problems.
"Hale seems very comfortable with the concept of horses and dog-walkers and hikers and mountain bikers sharing the trails," he said.
Legere also said "significant questions" still need to be answered about how stormwater and manure will be handled, given a stream on site that is "a tributary to Purgatory Brook, which feeds into the town's drinking water supply."
To date Wildstar Farm has only applied for an "order of conditions" from the Conservation Commission. The project will also need an environmental impact review from the Planning Board, Legere added.
Schlesinger said an application will be filed with the Planning Board shortly.
Though selectmen do not have direct say over the project, they weighed in last night. Ahearn said he considers the acquisition of Lowell Woods for open space one of his greatest achievements as a selectman.
"I don't want to see anything to devalue it in the townspeople's eyes," he said.
He told Schlesinger, "I hope that there can be middle ground where you and your clients can have a facility that you like and that you enjoy operating, and that fits within that neighborhood in a way so that it's not disruptive."
After the meeting, Newman said, "people are creating an issue where there isn't one."
He also emphasized that he and his wife only found out that Wildstar would be discussed at the selectmen's meeting "by accident" yesterday morning.
"It feels to us like somebody's doing something improper when you have a meeting before town officials and you don't notify the people concerned," Newman said.
Daily News staff writer Edward B. Colby can be reached at 781-433-8336 or ecolby@cnc.com.
