The Jaffrey Zoning Board upheld its original decision to deny a 16-unit housing development after reviewing a request for rehearing on Tuesday, and also heard an appeal regarding a topsoil business.
The application, submitted by Fougere Homes, proposed 16 condominium units at 79 Town Farm Road, a 24.7-acre lot that has one home and some outbuildings. The town’s density calculator indicated that six homes could be built on the lot, with the board finding that there were no unique characteristics of the property that prevented it from being developed in its intended manner.
The board denied the application earlier this year, and Fougere Homes requested a rehearing on the grounds that three of the five variance requirements were found lacking without clear and compelling evidence, which hampers the applicants’ ability to appeal, among other issues.
Chair Walter Batchelder said there were two options that would trigger the board to rehear the case.
“The first is a technical error we made during the original hearing; the second would be is if new information has become known to us since that meeting,” Batchelder said. “I don’t see any of those two occurrences having happened.”
Batchelder said he stood by the decision of the original hearing and the findings of fact that the board wrote in response to the application.
“They were solid. They were clear. They were concise, and I think they get right to the crux of the reasons for us denying this variance,” Batchelder said. “So, I don’t see a reason for us to rehear this case.”
“I agree with everything you just said,” said board member Laurel Cameron.
The board unanimously agreed to deny the request for a rehearing, finding the board had not made a technical error, that there had been no new information presented and that their original findings of fact were concise and clear.
In a separate hearing, also on Tuesday, the board reviewed an appeal of an administrative decision by the town’s code officer to cease and desist the use of a topsoil and loam screening business on Hadley Road, which is in the town’s rural district. The business, owned by Edward and Carmen Van Blarcom, operates at 113 Hadley Road and has been halted as of May 30.
Jason Reimers, an attorney representing the Van Blarcoms, said the crux of the matter was whether loam and topsoil screening is a permitted agricultural use in the rural district, which he argued it was. Reimers said the property has produced maple syrup, processed and sold cordwood, grown a corn crop and raised livestock, including cows, bulls and pigs, and hosted a horse-riding ring. The property also has a variance that allows its use as a snowmobile dealership.
Reimers said the Van Blarcoms have been operating the business since 2002, first with soil from the property, then from another farm belonging to the Van Blarcoms. As of 2025, they have been getting unscreened soil from CNC Trucking. He said the majority of the soil — about 80% — is brought in and out of the property by a single truck owned by Ed Van Blarcom. Reimers said the soil is sold for agricultural and landscaping uses.
Reimers said the operation is “not industrial in scale” and is an agricultural use. He noted that the state’s definition of “agricultural use” is intentionally broad and includes anything ancillary to the agricultural use. He said it specifically allows activities related to composting and allows for the trucking of materials related to agricultural uses.
“Agriculture includes trucking things on to the farm; it includes trucking things away from the farm, and it includes making soil for growing things, which is what the Van Blarcoms have been doing for 22 years, continuously,” Reimers said.
The board discussed the issue, suggesting that loam and topsoil screening seemed to be a gray area. Members voted unanimously to uphold the original decision that the screening was not an allowed use in the district but added a caveat that would allow the business to resume if the owners filed a request for a variance in time for the board’s September meeting. Reimers indicated they would be able to do so.