originally published in
The Free Lance-Star, July 2, 2001

By DONNIE JOHNSTON
Date published: Sun, 07/2/2001

Fruit and vegetable stands line U.S. 211 heading to Shenandoah National Park. Selling homegrown produce to tourists constitutes a major form of commerce in Rappahannock.

While other localities struggle with sprawl,
Rappahannock County has protected the rural splendor that makes it one of Virginia's most beautiful places. This is the second in a two-part series looking at the
county's commitment
to preserving a vanishing way of life.

YOU WON'T find Andy Taylor, Aunt Bea or even Barney Fife walking the streets of Little Washington, Flint Hill or Sperryville.

But you will find much of the same homespun atmosphere in Rappahannock County that exists in the mythical town of Mayberry.

Sheriff Larry Sherertz and his deputies still rattle doors at night to make sure they're locked. And if you're going to be out of town, they will check on your home every day you're gone.

Sherertz personally works one of the two county school crossings each morning and afternoon and his seven-member staff makes daily checks to ensure that elderly residents who have health problems and live alone are OK.

An employee-pay dispute in 1999 that ended in a killing was the county's first homicide in 13 years. Most crimes, Sherertz says, are typically youth-related and nonviolent.

For commuters who work in Northern Virginia, blood pressures drop dramatically when they reach the Rappahannock line, the sheriff says.

"We have no road rage," he says. "The highways are not congested and we're not in a hurry."

Rappahannock has one high school and one elementary, with a total enrollment of about 1,000. A new wing that opened last fall gives the high school excess capacity to handle student growth for at least the next five years.

On the down side, Rappahannock is one of the few high schools in Virginia that doesn't have a football team.

Like most localities, the school system eats up most of the county's $14 million budget.

"We only have nine employees that the Board of Supervisors can hire or fire and our landfill is paid for," county Zoning Administrator John McCarthy says. "We have very few unanticipated revenue needs. Relatively speaking, I think we're doing great."

With an extremely small commercial tax base, the bulk of the county's revenue comes from property owners. The real-estate tax rate of 81 cents per $100 of assessed value is relatively high for a rural county, but far below that of most Northern Virginia localities.

The county's three largest businesses are the Rappahannock Farmer's Co-op, the Faith Mountain catalog company and the Inn at Little Washington, a nationally acclaimed restaurant. And aside from agriculture, tourism is Rappahannock's largest industry.

"We're selling the view," McCarthy says.

And a view unmarred by subdivisions and shopping centers is a welcome sight for the thousands of tourists who pass through Rappahannock each summer and fall on their way to the Shenandoah National Park and Skyline Drive. They buy homegrown fruits and vegetables from the small family businesses in and around Sperryville.

In commerce, as with almost everything in Rappahannock, the operative word is small. And that's the way most people want to keep it.

That's the reason most support the county's restrictive zoning laws--which require 25 acres to build a home in all but the few village areas of the county.

But how long, many outsiders ask, can Rappahannock resist the growth they see as inevitable?

Already developers have their sights set on prime properties in the Amissville area that could be turned into subdivisions.

The mountain views around Chester Gap and Huntly are only a stone's throw from Interstate 66, a prime artery to Northern Virginia. Builders would love to set up shop there.

While most residents like Rappahannock the way it is, some large landholders are beginning to feel the financial constraints that come with tight zoning laws.

Helen Dixon proposed building a golf course on U.S. 211 near Amissville and ran into difficulties with both the county and a neighborhood anti-growth group.

"I was told that a golf course would brings in too many drunks and too much traffic and that there would be a problem with the availability of water and pesticide runoff," she says.

Her plans to spend as much as $10 million on the project are now on hold.

"No-growth is a bad attitude for people to have," she says.

For others, trying to keep the family farm as property taxes rise is a complex and emotional issue.

Sue Deal and her sister inherited their childhood home and 400 prime acres near Sperryville two years ago when their mother died. While Deal wants to keep the farm intact, she admits that someday soon she might be faced with a prospect her mother steadfastly refused to consider: selling off parcels of the land.

"Inevitably the time is going to come when it is going to get subdivided," Deal says. "I'm resigned to that."

But under the county's ordinance, Deal and her sister will, at best, get 16 25-acre lots from the farm. That means they will likely get far less for the property than if they could sell it in five-acre parcels.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Pete Estes says that's the price to be paid for remaining rural.

"You have to think of the good of the county instead of your individual welfare," Estes says.

Newbill Miller, a longtime county official who was on Rappahannock's first Planning Commission, doesn't think large landowners are hurt that much by tight zoning laws.

"Property values are still high and tax rates are reasonable," he contends.

In fact, most people moving into the county want the laws tightened, Miller says.

To most, that doesn't seem possible. After all, Rappahannock now processes only about 60 building permits for new construction per year. Spotsylvania County issues that many in almost any given two-week period.

Miller believes if the board ever tries to open the county to small subdivisions, voters will stop the measure by way of referendum. Several politicians have run on a more-growth platform. All have lost.

"Rappahannock people are proud of their county the way it is now," Miller says.

A few large landowners are dividing their properties into 50-acre parcels (this can be done without Planning Commission approval) and selling them to affluent outsiders who are building expensive homes on them.

There are also some 25-acre lots on the market. But most of the available land in Rappahannock is either large parcels or small lots grandfathered under the zoning ordinances.

Can the county keep growth at bay forever?

"I think it can go on for a long time," Estes says. "We're in this for the long haul."

Sherertz expects the big-money developers to eventually challenge the 25-acre ordinance, but he, too, believes low-growth forces will prevail.

Miller points to the 1962 zoning ordinance that started it all and says: "That is the document that saved the county. Things snowballed after that.

"How did we do it? Easy. We just learned to say no."