Planning board hears info on miniature golf course

Published 5:02 pm Wednesday, May 24, 2017

Thirty-three “realistic animals” are coming to Washington to become part of Animal Adventure Miniature Golf, which should open in about three to four weeks, according to owners Harold and Linda Curtis.

The Curtises attended the Washington Planning Board meeting Tuesday evening, during which Glen Moore, a city planner, informed the board about the miniature golf course that will be located behind Pelican’s SnoBall off Carolina Avenue. The Curtises own the snoball business.

Harold Curtis said some of the animals should arrive Friday, followed by others later. Linda Curtis said the animals will serve an educational purpose. Informational boards providing facts about the animals will be erected with the animals, she said. School groups will be able to combine recreation and education with visits to Animal Adventure, she said.

The Planning Board was told the gravel parking lot for Animal Adventure would be mostly behind the former Sears building off Carolina Avenue.

Miniature golf courses are permitted in the city’s B-2 (business) districts. Moore told the board said the city’s technical review committee — which includes representatives from the city’s planning, fire and building inspections departments — has signed off on the latest site plan and given a green light to the project.

In other business, the board voted 2-1 to recommend the City Council rezone 11.23 acres on U.S. Highway 17 at its intersection with New Hope Road from office and institutional to B-2 (general business). Dot Moate, the board’s vice chairwoman, could not vote because she was presiding over the meeting as chairman in the absence of John B. Tate III, the board’s chairman. If Moate was allowed to vote, the rezoning request would not have move forward because she opposed it along with board member Jane Alligood. Moate said she could support rezoning less land, but not the 11.23 acres. Voting to recommend the council rezone the land were Marie Barber Freeman and D. Howell Miller.

Jason Briley, representing East Carolina Farms, the applicant, said he has plans to build a utility equipment business on the land.

The council will consider the request at its June 12 meeting.

 

 

About Mike Voss

Mike Voss is the contributing editor at the Washington Daily News. He has a daughter and four grandchildren. Except for nearly six years he worked at the Free Lance-Star in Fredericksburg, Va., in the early to mid-1990s, he has been at the Daily News since April 1986.
Journalism awards:
• Pulitzer Prize for Meritorious Public Service, 1990.
• Society of Professional Journalists: Sigma Delta Chi Award, Bronze Medallion.
• Associated Press Managing Editors’ Public Service Award.
• Investigative Reporters & Editors’ Award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Public Service Award, 1989.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Investigative Reporting, 1990.
All those were for the articles he and Betty Gray wrote about the city’s contaminated water system in 1989-1990.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Investigative Reporting, 1991.
• North Carolina Press Association, Third Place, General News Reporting, 2005.
• North Carolina Press Association, Second Place, Lighter Columns, 2006.
Recently learned he will receive another award.
• North Carolina Press Association, First Place, Lighter Columns, 2010.
4. Lectured at or served on seminar panels at journalism schools at UNC-Chapel Hill, University of Maryland, Columbia University, Mary Washington University and Francis Marion University.

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