NIMBY wine wars erupt over a funeral at a California winery

The Disunited States sucks right now. I'm saying this as a guy who wrote my Thanksgiving wine column for Palate Press about how we should all just get along.

Then I took a look at the comments on this story about a winemaker's funeral in Santa Barbara County. There's something really wrong with this country, and this story and the comments encapsulate it.

First, the setup. Winemaker Seth Kunin died unexpectedly last month of a heart attack at age 50. Patrick Comiskey wrote a nice obit of Kunin for the LA Times. Kunin was a beloved guy in the chummy Santa Barbara winemaking scene.

Naturally, people who worked with him wanted to hold a memorial service. Larner Vineyard offered to host it. This was a great location because Larner Vineyard has for years sold its grapes to young winemakers just starting out, thus helping to foster that community.

Larner Vineyard had fought with neighbors when it wanted to open a winery and tasting room. I am not taking a position on this. Santa Barbara County can be very NIMBY*, but I have driven on Ballard Canyon Road to Larner Vineyard and it does require attentiveness. That said, the permit was issued; the vineyard and winery are open (albeit not for drop-in tasting). And earlier this month, more than a year after the zoning decision, the memorial service was scheduled.

(* Not In My Back Yard; people who don't generally oppose development but don't want it next to them)

Knowing how popular Kunin was, the Larners hired traffic attendants to staff the memorial service. The service was popular enough that the parking lot filled and about a dozen cars had to park out on the road. Not an ideal situation on Ballard Canyon Road, but there were parking attendants, and it was not exactly a wine-release party.

Someone anonymously filed a complaint with the county, claiming the Larners violated their winery permit by hosting a big event that caused traffic disruptions. The Larners counter that it wasn't an event for commercial purposes. The county will investigate.

Why I'm writing this blog post: the aggressive, nasty tone of the comments from one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. People who live in Santa Ynez Valley, in or around Ballard Canyon, they live in paradise. And they're in California: they should be doing yoga, smoking soon-to-be legal weed and coexisting.

Instead, here are a few snippets:

"I am disgusted that this HAG would stoop so low."


"I know that this is blasphemy--especially in a world where the consumption of alcohol is a national past-time, but I remember how the neighbors in that area did NOT want wineries in their area, and there was a big battle over this, but they forced their way into what was once a quite, peaceful area. (And those neighbors pay a lot of money to get away from the rowdy drunk scene)"

"It's not "blasphemy," it's just a stupid thing to say in this thread about a neighbor filing a complaint about a memorial service."

"Calling someone's comment "stupid" because you dislike their point of view is not helpful and contributes nothing of value."

"I'm sorry, I meant "insensitive and off topic." There, do you understand now?"

"May I pose this scenario: Joe Blow the local beloved mechanic dies, and his family wants to hold a gathering at their home. There's not a lot of room for everyone to park, so the cars spill out into the surrounding neighborhood, creating overcrowding on the street ... So, do Joe Blow's family and friends get a pass because Joe was a great guy, a pillar of the community and everyone loved him? Probably not. Joe Blow was a mechanic. He wasn't wealthy and he wasn't part of the exalted wine industry." 

"I am 99% certain that unless Joe the Mechanic's neighbors are gigantic jerk faces, nobody would complain about that either. Then again, given that Joe was so beloved and his neighbors weren't invited, they probably are big enough jerk faces to complain."

"I attended the event. Although there were parking attendants, they ran out of space to park cars so about a dozen were parked alongside the road, far enough off the pavement so no traffic was blocked. As far as your Joe Blow analogy, none of the neighbors park on the street."  

"So what I hear is that if a grieving family has money to hire attendants for their loved ones post funeral gathering, then the neighbors have no rights to peace, quiet, and a place to park. Did I read that correctly?"

"horrible neighbors. they need to die or go somewhere else"

And then this just weird conclusion, at the time I'm writing this anyway ...

"AVA= American Viticultural Area the SYV has 9 of the 107 or so recognized in the state. It's part of what creates the distinction of diversity to define our great wine region."

*************

I mean, a guy died, people loved him but we ALL HATE EACH OTHER!!!! At least we have "our great wine region."

What's wrong with us?

Today instead of saying follow me on social media blah blah, I'll say, Take that tiny amount of energy and use it to say something nice to somebody. Anybody.