Two months after deadlocking over Red Point Taphouse’s request for a special use permit that would waive a requirement that the brewery connect to town water, Smithfield’s Planning Commission voted 5-2 on Feb. 11 to recommend denying the waiver.

Commissioner GiGi Smith, whose December motion to recommend the Town Council approve Red Point’s request for relief from a condition of the brewery’s 2020 rezoning ended in a 3-3 tie, this time urged denial.

“We’re glad that you’re here and it does not do me any good to say I want you to close down; I don’t. I just want you to do what you said you would do … what you agreed to do after the first time it was extended,” Smith said.

Red Point’s former co-owner Tim Ryan told the Planning Commission last year that he and his business partners had reluctantly agreed, within two years of opening Red Point, to connect the circa-1929 former gas station on South Church Street to town water, not knowing at the time that it would cost over $30,000 to have town contractors extend the required 2-inch water connection from the opposite side of the road to where the business is located. Red Point is now served by a private well that predates the town’s annexation of the area.

Ryan says the five-figure cost could shutter the brewery. It would equate to nearly 100% of the Red Point’s 2024 profits, which Ryan said has been negatively impacted by the ongoing rehabilitation of the Cypress Creek Bridge. Since January, the Virginia Department of Transportation has restricted the two-lane bridge connecting downtown Smithfield to the east end of town to a single westbound lane with eastbound traffic diverted via Main and Grace Streets to the Route 10 Bypass.

In January, Ryan and co-owners Nick Hess and Derek Joyner sold Red Point to Ben and Elen Osmanson, though the trio retains ownership of the building.

“It’s the longest-standing business that’s ever been in that building, so let’s not take that away,” Hess told the Planning Commission on Feb. 11.

Commissioners Charles Bryan, Bill Davidson, Thomas Pope and James Yoko each voted in support of Smith’s motion to recommend denial. Commissioner Darren Cutler and Planning Commission Chairwoman Julia Hillegass voted against the motion.

“I have mixed emotions about this; I do want us to be open for business, to provide some relief to a small business … but their previous SUP was approved conditionally based on the things that they promised to do,” Hillegass said.

Cutler said he would have supported granting a waiver to allow Red Point to continue using the well until if and when the town installs a second water main along the north side of South Church Street where Red Point is located. But water lines spanning both sides of the same road isn’t something the town has ever done, according to Community Development and Planning Director Tammie Clary.

“Pretty much in any development, any town, including South Church Street, there is only one water line,” Bryan said.

The Planning Commission, at its September meeting, had recommended granting Red Point another two-year extension to connect to town water, citing the bridge work. The Town Council, however, as a condition of granting Red Point a special use permit exempting the brewery from having to pave its parking lot, in October reduced from the recommended two years to 30 days the window for Ryan to either connect to town water or file for a special separate use permit to resolve the issue. Ryan chose the latter, filing his permit application on Oct. 24.

“It will just come up again,” Smith said at the Feb. 11 meeting.

Ryan now says he should never have agreed to connect to town water as a condition of his 2020 rezoning. A memorandum from Clary to the Planning Commission states the issue pertains to Town Code Section 82-45, which states, “Where a public water supply is available in the town it shall be unlawful to connect a residential or commercial structure to a private well,” and Section 2.4 of the town design standards for water distribution, which states “in the event that a commercial property renovates their building, the water service line shall be upgraded to 2-inch.”

“It does not say that it’s unlawful to be connected. … we’re not asking to connect to private water,” Ryan said.

Town Attorney Bill Riddick said the well connection would have remained legal had Ryan not renovated the space and at the time of his 2020 rezoning application proffered to connect to town water within two years.

“They would still be grandfathered on the well but for the fact that they chose to do what they did,” Riddick said.

Editor’s note: This story was updated on Feb. 15 at 12:36 p.m. to correct that the vote was 5-2, not 4-2.