News

Homeowners pack hearing to oppose therapy center

Therapy Newfoundlands Amelia and Milan attended a meeting of the Zoning Board of Adjustment.

By Bill Moss, Published: January 31, 2024

An overflow crowd turned out Wednesday to oppose a special-use permit to allow an animal-assisted therapy center on a 4.76-acre parcel of land on Evans Road about three-quarters northwest of Kanuga Lake Road.

TimberKnolls Spirit Cove wants to develop a 4,000-square-foot therapy center plus a six-acre pasture, a barn and private, fenced residences for the organization's therapy animals and staff on a 16-acre site it bought from Kanuga Conference Center.

After hearing the applicant's case for four hours and 20 minutes, the Zoning Board of Adjustment recessed the meeting until 4 p.m. Friday, Feb. 23, in the 100 N. King St. meeting room.

The zoning board ruled that two neighboring homeowners on Evans Road and Kanuga Ridge Road — John Newcomer and his wife and Michael Gregory — had standing to oppose the special-use permit.

Describing the therapy center's work, Spirit Cove CEO Lisa Schuller said she was inspired to start a Newfoundland- and horse-assisted therapy business after a near-death experience.

"Eight years ago life I had a life-threatening brain tumor and was told I might not have 24 hours to live," she said. When  a nurse came in to her room to check on her, "I asked if there was a dog in the hospital." It turned out there was. "I wrapped my arms around that dog and those were the only moments of peace I had during that time."

After emergency brain surgery saved her life, she vowed she would leave her corporate job and start a therapy-dog-assisted business. Spirit Cove has since its founding in 2018 opened facilities in 21 states and served more 107,000 individuals nationwide. Clients include military veterans, first responders, teachers, doctors and nurses and other professionals who have suffer from PTSD or other trauma-induced anxiety disorders.

Gregory testified that he expected "noise, pollution, safety of folks and traffic" would damage the harmony of the rural character of the Evans Road community.

Newcomer said he would offer expert testimony from an appraiser about the effect of a therapy center on his home's value.

"We have testimony from our appraiser that our land will be substantially injured by this special zoning and testimony that this use is not in keeping with the harmony of our neighborhood, and that  this special use will endanger me, my wife, our property and our neighbors," he said.

Matt Sprouse, Spirit Cove's landscape architect, described the process of designing the site plan, including the grade of the site, the sight-lines from the driveway in either direction and siting a septic system and a well. The therapy  center would be 200 feet from Evans Road, he said, and an existing mature forest will provide a 125-foot buffer between the road and the structure. The therapy center would be 408 feet from Gregory's home and 304 feet from the Newcomers' home.

Upon questioning from Spirit Cove's attorney, Brian Gulden, Sprouse said "I absolutely believe it's in harmony" with the surrounding property. Spirit Cove's leaders had told him, he testified, that the center would serve from five to 25 clients a day. "We placed the driveway in the best placement, the safest placement from an environmental standpoint and from a traffic standpoint." He went on to say that use of the land — the hours, the gardening and the pasture — is in keeping with surroudning uses and in harmony with the area.

After a half-hour break, the zoning board reconvened at 7 p.m. Gulden called the applicant's first expert witness, real estate appraiser Lynn Carmichael. She testified that she conducted a market impact study for the Spirit Cove use. Carmichael said she looked at commercial uses in residential zones and analyzed the trend of property sales from 2016 to 2023 within one year, five years and in the entire zip code area. The examples she found, she said, showed no "injurious impact" from a rezoning to commercial. She testified that her analysis concluded "there will be no injurious impact on residential property values directly resulting from an office on the Evans Road property."

The applicant called Ed Thompson, a firefighter for 13 years who suffered from PTSD after his peers on his team died fighting a fire. He said he was testifying "to put a face" on the nature of Spirit Cove's treatment and the character of its clients. "They're a powerful source of comfort and kindness," he said of the therapy dogs, known as Newfies.