Posted on 08/02/2008 3:28:39 PM PDT by Graybeard58
KENT -- Jon Hoose's first crop of sweet corn he'd ever grown started to come in this summer about as well as the 17-year-old could have hoped.
He'd gotten his own rumbling John Deere tractor as a high school graduation gift. His dad, a former dairy farmer, helped him secure about 20 acres of leased land, and loaned him the cash to plant corn and pumpkins.
In early July, he stacked harvested corn on a picnic table at the end of his driveway on Davis Road, scrawled two cardboard signs advertising sweet corn and put them out on Route 341. He stationed his 13-year-old brother, Tom, to man the operation. When Tom wasn't there, they left a jar for customers to pay their $6 a dozen.
It was an operation they assumed was as harmless as a lemonade stand, but only about 10 days and $300 later, they received a letter from the town. They were running an unauthorized business, the letter said, and the signs on the road were prohibited by town ordinance. They had to stop selling corn by July 23.
"What are we going to do with it? We've got all this corn now," said Horse, who spent his four years at Housatonic Valley Regional High School in the National FFA Organization. Their plan was to sell about 25 percent of it from the picnic table. The rest they already made an arrangement to sell wholesale. Horse is saving his profits, partly to go to college.
On top of that, Hoose and his father, Tim Hoose, had purposely planned for their corn to come in later than most corn crops. They hoped to be the only game in town later this summer and early this fall, when most farmers may have run out. Over the next two months, most of their corn will reach it's peak.
"We'll sell wholesale what we can, and maybe give some away," Hoose said. "We can't let it go bad."
To operate a roadside stand, Kent residents must apply for a permit from the Planning and Zoning Commission. There has to be a free-standing structure to house the stand, adequate parking, and approval of the plan during a hearing. The process can take as little as a week, or as many as three months, said Jennifer Lemansky, land use administrator.
By that time, corn season could be over for this year.
The Connecticut Farm Bureau routinely hears questions from farmers who are told by their towns they're violating rules and ordinances, said Joan Nichols, government relations specialist with the bureau. "Unfortunately because we're a home-rule state, sometimes common sense doesn't always come into play," she said.
She said most towns have ordinances about agriculture but rules vary wildly from towns that are accommodating to farmers and others that are "not so agriculturally friendly."
"I didn't think it was a big deal to sell corn at the end of your driveway. Farmers don't have time to screw around with small-town, stupid politics," Tim Hoose said. "He's doing something practical with his life ... and he's doing something important."
As he drove his pickup truck past the pumpkins growing steadily next to the corn on Friday evening, Jon Hoose, for one, was hoping something gets straightened out before his next harvest is ready just as they planned it, in time for Halloween.
Nah, I thought of that about 25 years ago or so when I sold stuff out of my house after our divorce. I was going to advertise it as a post-divorce sale.
What property rights? If you think you own property, just miss a tax payment and you will see who owns what.
You rent your house from the County or City on a year to year basis.
He was selling the corn from his driveway, fer crissakes!
What kind of socialist paradise is he living in???
This should be moved to News Activism. More worthy of discussion of Liberty and Freedom than the zot threads.
That stand was the model for almost every other one in that valley for 50 years. I believe my grandfather and his timber camp friends would have run any city councilor right out of the state for being shi**y enough to shut a kid down for selling corn by the side of the road.
Legal hairsplitting or not, it was a petty thing to do to the kid. Calling them on their pettyness is not whining.
Welcome to Amerika, land of the formerly free.
Kent is in Litchfield County. The beautiful people from New York have taken over most of the small towns. The old time townies have lost all power and have been reduced to servants to them.
Has that ever happened? (I mean other than something that happened in California, of course)
You have mail.
Looks like the commies are trying to crush American ingenuity again.
Don’t be cursing us farmers with your mouth full, Greybeard. ;)
In many, many places it’s easier to plead ignorance and ask forgiveness than jump through the fired-up hoops needed to meet the SOCIALIST agendas that are alive and thriving in many corners of our country.
Anyone that’s smart barters underground amongst friends and family for their needs. The minute you go public, Mother Government and her leftist minions will be on you like a chicken on a June Bug. ;)
Our Underground Rconomy is thriving and it bugs the hell out of the commies who want every d@mn DIME of your hard-earned money handed over to them so they can redistribute the wealth.
You’re a very smart guy. I’m surprised at your opinion on this one?
I say screw ‘em! (Sorry. I’m feeling quite Libertarian today...but without all the pot smokin’, LOL!)
I'm gettin' senile. Where did I do that?
I only said, obey the law or accept the consequences, work to change the law, or do business where the law doesn't exist. I am not anti farmer at all.
Give my regards to the DUmmies, ya commie.
(j/k)
But I loves apple pie.
Well, I’m outraged that there are even laws on the books like this to begin with.
Enjoy your garden while you can because it won’t be long before you’re taxed on each tomato plant you grow for your personal use. The time will come when you’ll be forced to plant a ‘Victory Garden’ and will then be forced to “share” with your neighbors, The Grasshoppers, who chose to fiddle away the day versus putting up their own food. (Oh, wait. That’s already happening each and every day!!)
Work to change the law? Why is there a law in the first place about growing your own food and selling it for a fair price to others that will readily pay you for what it’s worth? What business is it of Government to get a percentage of the take on YOUR hard work? None, IMHO. (I hate looking at the deductions confiscated from me on my paycheck, too. It burns me up!)
We’re reaping the “benefits” of the fifty years of socialism that’s been foisted upon us because we’re a bunch of conservative p*ssies who don’t stand up to this stuff in the first place.
I’m not mad at you. I’m just mad. ;)
It sounds more to me that this young man is having a James Rearden experience. In "Atlas Shrugged" Rearden has the purpose of law explained to him by government hack. They want you to break their laws and to feel shame so that they can exercise control over by using your own embarrassment to counter your belief in free enterprise.
For some reason unknown to sane folks, I planted 53 tomatoes and finally got the last of them staked and tied yesterday. Nothing like gardening when it's 105 outside! ;-)
I second your rant. Every last word.
That’s what you got regarding a farmer selling corn on his property? Something that’s been done for centuries.
President Obama will fix everything!
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