Yasgur Road denied as Woodstock reunion site

By CHARLIE BUTERBAUGH

BETHEL, NY — Campsites for 2,000 hippies and Yasgur roadies will be unavailable at Yasgur’s Farm on August 12, 13, and 14, the weekend of the 36th anniversary of the 1969 Woodstock Festival.

On July 18, the Town of Bethel Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) denied Yasgur Road Productions’ application to set up a temporary campsite during the weekend. Roy Howard and Jeryl Abramson, who have been playing host to the annual reunion for 10 years, needed the ZBA’s approval in order to ask the Bethel Planning Board to renew a permit to hold the event this year.

The question now, it seems, is where the peace-loving pilgrims will go when they show up to commemorate the historic Woodstock weekend.

“The thing’s going to take place whether it’s at our place or elsewhere in the Town of Bethel,” Abramson said.

After the meeting, she confirmed that her farm on Yasgur Road would not be open for this year’s reunion.

Abramson said yasgurroad.com, the website that advertises the festival weekend, would read, “Stay home. The town has denied us the permit. Make other arrangements.”

When this issue of TRR went to press, the original invitation to the reunion had been removed from the website’s front page.

In the end, it wasn’t the three or four neighbors’ vocal opposition that killed the camping permit application.

It wasn’t Harold Russel’s claim that his dairy cows produce less milk because the loud music, fireworks and smoke from reunion revelers’ campfires make the animals nervous.

It wasn’t Darren Wiseman’s comment that the festival “is nothing more than an opportunity for people to come and hang a blue tarp on the side of their vehicle, raise hell for three weekends and be on their way.”

And it wasn’t the fact that Howard and Abramson violated the conditions of their permit last year by allowing camping during the weekend.

Robert McEwan, attorney for the ZBA, said Yasgur Road Productions’ application did not state the environmental impacts of the temporary campground adequately, thus preventing the board’s complete review. Further, Howard and Abramson, who are disputing the 2004 application fees imposed by the town, decided against setting up a required escrow account with the building department this year. And the public needed at least 30 days to comment on the environmental assessment form once it was submitted.

Since these requirements were not met, the ZBA unanimously denied the camping permit application.

“We offered them [Bethel] toilets, security and insurance for an event they know is going to happen, and they turned our offer down,” Abramson said after the meeting. “Now, what happens this August is the town’s headache.”

As though speaking to officials, she said, “Be careful what you wish for.”