If you believe in our goal of sharing the beauty of historic farms and enabling farms to remain financially sustainable in Summit, we’d love your support!
About Our Farm
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and considering supporting White Stag 1894 farm as well as other Summit Farms! As you likely know we are a historic farm located in the Village of Summit. In 2018, my family purchased the historic farm, which was in a state of disrepair. We’ve spent the past five years restoring the farm, which included restoring its original barns, often using traditional woodworking techniques and creating our own lumber using trees on the property. It’s been a blast that we’re excited to continue.
As we’ve restored the property, we’ve also started a flower farm. In 2023 we planted 400 peonies and 4,000 tulips which we sold out of our farm stand and then we hosted a successful summer u-pick season with zinnias, sunflowers and tulips. This year, we decided to focus on u-picks because we loved having everyone on our farm. We can’t wait to see everyone for our Zinnia U-picks in August. After six years of restoration, the space has become something almost out of a story book.
Renting our barns to you!
We love our farm, and one of our goals is to share its beauty with the community. To do this, we’d like to offer it as an event venue for you all to host events, such as fundraisers, birthday parties, educational seminars, and other events.
By allowing venue rentals and agritourism, we hope to provide farms with additional revenue streams to diversify their income and become more economically sustainable. As many of you know farms are just like any other business – they can have good years and they can have bad years. For farms though, many of their largest costs are fixed in land and major investments like barn renovations and heavy machinery. In a bad year, it is incredibly difficult for farms to get by.
Before we can do this, we need permission from the Village. The Village is hosting a listening session on an Event Barn and Agritourism Ordinance on Thursday, May 29. Any member of the Village, or adjacent to it, can speak for 2 minutes.
Should they choose to go forward with an event barn and agritourism proposal it would benefit ALL summit farms.
AGENDA
Zoning Code Land Use Sub-Committee
Village of Summit
Thursday, May 29, 2025, 6 pm
We Need Your Support
If you believe in our goal of sharing the beauty of historic farms and enabling farms to remain financially sustainable, we’d love your support. There are few great ways to do this:
1. Write an Email in Support
You can write an email to the Special Committee expressing your support. Even three sentences will make a difference! Please see an example and additional details below.
A super easy way to support our farm (and others) is to sign the electronic petition we started. This will take you less than 30 seconds and is still a powerful way to show your support.
3. Speak in Support
You can attend the upcoming Meeting and speak in support of the events and agritourism in Summit. They will open up the meeting to the public at the very end and anyone can speak for 1 minute total. Even 1-2 sentences will do! For example, “My name is _____ and I support an event barn and agritourism ordinance.”
4. Pray
You can pray for us, our family, and the farm. This has been a long, costly process, and we’ve only just begun.
Thanks again for taking the time to read this, and I’d love to talk with you about the ordinance and our plans for the farm. Please let me know if you have any questions.
– Rebekah Carsey and Lisa Tadych
Rebekah.carsey@gmail.com | 715.892.1221 | 37736 Sunset Drive Oconomowoc, WI 53066
Example Email / Letter 1
Email the following Land Use Sub-Committee members and White Stag:
planner@summitvillage.org, administrator@summitvillage.org, president@summitvillage.org, trustee1@summitvillage.org, plan6@summitvillage.org, plan4@summitvillage.org, info@whitestag1894.com
OR message here: https://summitvillage.org/contact-us/
Zoning Code Land Use Sub-Committee,
My name is NAME, and I live at ADDRESS. I’ve been a resident of Summit for NUMBER years.
I am writing this email in support of event facilities (specifically allowing farms to use their barns for events) and agritourism in Summit.
Here is why:
INCLUDE YOUR REASONS WHY. EXAMPLES OF WHY YOU SUPPORT THE ORDNANCE COULD BE:
To support small businesses, support local farms, support woman owned business/promote diversity, you see a need for venue rental in Summit (specifically at farms, in nature, etc), fear that not supporting farms will lead to sale of land for suburban development, help preserve local farms and historic barns, local options for fundraisers, etc
Regards,
NAME
PHONE
ADDRESS
NOTE: Feel free to use the below example as a starting point. Making it personal to you will go a long way!
Example Email / Letter 2
Zoning Code Land Use Sub-Committee,
My name is NAME, and I live at ADDRESS. I’ve been a resident of Summit for NUMBER years.
I am writing this email in support of event facilities (specifically allowing farms to use their barns for events) and agritourism in Summit. As an active member of a local church, school, and other community groups, I believe these types of venues will fit a community need. The community needs beautiful places to hold events and bring us together, whether it be for an educational seminar, birthday party, fundraiser, or other event. Right now, the Village does not have any options outside of standard conference rooms, which are often not the right fit for the event type or audience.
In addition to providing a place to bring the community together, I support this ordinance as it will enable farms to diversify their revenue stream and remain sustainable. Like many members of this community, I value the fact that it is rural, and I’d like to keep it that way. To do this, I believe we should do everything possible to support our historic farms and help them to be financially stable, especially during down years of farming. During my residency in the Lake Country area, I have seen large parcels of land developed and turned into sprawling neighborhoods with concrete, asphalt, and noise. I am fearful large farms may find selling their land to developers attractive, especially if we as a community limit their income streams and do not support them.
In closing, please accept this letter as my highest support of the proposed ordinance. Please do not hesitate to contact me if I can provide any additional context or if I can make my support of this ordinance better known. Thank you for your time and consideration.
Regards,
NAME
PHONE
ADDRESS