Cannot reach a .local domain without setting an option with discoveryutil
There was an answer posted to this discussion.


  Linc Davis 
  
  The "local" TLD is reserved for Bonjour. The restriction was not
  enforced in older versions of OS X, but it is in Yosemite. Unicast
  domain names with that TLD will not resolve by default. To make your
  configuration change permanent (not recommended), create your own
  launch daemon. Don't modify an existing one. See the launchd.plist(5)
  man page for details. A much better solution would be to change the
  domain name.


There is a wikipedia article on the .local domain which does state:


  Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) standards-track RFC 6762, which
  has been approved and was officially published on February 20, 2013,
  essentially reserves the use of .local as a pseudo-TLD for link-local
  hostnames that can be resolved via the Multicast DNS name resolution
  protocol.


So, the answer is that I should not be using .local in the way I am currently using it in order to comply with current standards.