PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A brewery in Philadelphia’s East Kensington neighborhood is outraged after they say a city crew cut down a legally-grown hop crop the brewery was growing for a seasonal beer. The crew apparently thought the plants were overgrown weeds.
The Philadelphia Brewing Company makes a beer called Harvest From the Hood every year. The brewery says that the hops they grow in an adjacent 18-by-70-foot lot on Frankford Avenue are an essential ingredient in the beer.
“We’ve been using this garden in partnership with the New Kensington [Community Development Corporation] for 10 years,” said Nancy Barton. She and her husband Bill Barton own the brewery. “They let us use the lot. We grow our hops that we use for Harvest From the Hood.”
However, there will be no Harvest from the Hood beer batch this year.
A Community Life Improvement Programs (CLIP) crew that maintains vacant lots in the city destroyed the plants on Tuesday, the owners said.
"The hops were doing so good. We were going to harvest them in a few weeks,” said Nancy Barton. She and her husband Bill Barton own the brewery.
They are extremely disappointed and don't understand how the garden was mistaken for out-of-control weeds.
"We have the buckets on the ground where the bines come up out of,” Nancy Barton explained.
They said at least 30 plants were growing, and they might have yielded 60 pounds of hops from the overall batch.
“We have two poles from one end of the lot to the other, and then we have coconut string that comes up out of each bin that the bines are attached to, and they are sticky, so they twirl around them and they grow up,” Nancy Barton described. “They were doing so good.”
The hop garden has a fence around it, and a sign that tells passers-by what it is and displays the brewery's and NKCDC's logos.
The Bartons say CLIP issued an overgrown vegetation violation last month, and the couple thought the matter was cleared up then.
"I called. I talked to the inspector. I explained what was going on. He said, ‘Oh, I see. I was out there. [Your case is] closed. You’re good. No fine,’” Nancy Barton said.
The Bartons said they will lose tens of thousands of dollars in revenue as a result of CLIP’s actions.
A city spokesperson said in a statement:
“Regrettably, due to miscommunication and staff error, the hops were removed as they were initially marked as a violation as it appeared the lot was overgrown. We are reaching out to Philadelphia Brewing and NKCDC to explain the situation, apologize and explore what we can do to rectify this situation. We’re also engaging with staff on the ground to ensure that proper procedures are followed in the future.”
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