The Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) is scheduled to consider a range of topics at its March 19 meeting, including the planned Hawleyville sanitary sewer system expansion project. The panel also is slated to discuss some open space acquisition proposals, plus three sets of proposed changes to the zoning regulations.

The session is scheduled for 7:30 pm on Thursday, March 19, at Newtown Municipal Center, 3 Primrose Street.

P&Z members are expected to discuss and make a recommendation on the town’s planned Hawleyville sewer system expansion project, which is intended to stimulate economic development in the area near the Exit 9 interchange of Interstate 84.

In February, Water & Sewer Authority (WSA) members approved having their consulting engineering firm, Fuss & O’Neill, Inc, do final design work on the sewer system extension.

Unlike the town’s central sewer system, which discharges its wastewater to the sewage treatment plant at 24 Commerce Road, the Hawleyville system discharges its wastewater to the regional sewage treatment plant in Danbury.

At a February 2014 town meeting, voters by an 81-to-11 margin approved borrowing $2.8 million to expand the Hawleyville system as a means to spur local economic development.

Fuss & O’Neill is expected to complete the sewer design work by late spring. Sewer system construction would start later this year.

Unlike a conventional gravity-powered sewer system, the Hawleyville sewer system extension would be operated with the use of grinder pumps. Such devices propel wastewater under low-pressure through narrow-diameter lines. A system powered by grinder pumps can be constructed faster, more simply, and more cheaply than a conventional sewer system.

Because the Hawleyville sewer expansion project is keyed to economic development, and is not based on the need to resolve existing groundwater pollution problems resulting from failing septic systems as is the case with the town's central sewer system, connecting to the Hawleyville sewer extension is optional.

The project would extend sewer lines from 166 Mt Pleasant Road eastward along Mt Pleasant Road to its intersection with Hawleyville Road. The sewer lines also would extend northward along sections of Hawleyville Road and along Covered Bridge Road.

The town Land Use Agency recently issued a wetlands/watercourses protection permit for the sewer system expansion project.

Open Space

In other business at the March 19 session, P&Z members will be asked to make recommendations concerning the town obtaining some open space land through property acquisitions.

The P&Z would be asked to make a recommendation on whether the town should acquire 2.98 acres in the vicinity of Echo Valley Road. That parcel abuts town-owned open space land. Acquiring that 2.98-acre parcel, in effect, would create a 56-acre contiguous land preserve with public access points at Alberts Hill Road, Valley Field Road North, Concord Ridge Road, and Winter Ridge Road.

The Conservation Commission has endorsed the land acquisition.

Also, P&Z members will be asked whether the town should acquire as open space about one-eighth of an acre near 76/76-A Walnut Tree Hill Road. The land abuts town open space. The property would become part of Al Trail’s, a local open space trail. The Conservation Commission has endorsed that acquisition.

Rob Sibley, deputy director of planning and land use, said that if the P&Z endorses the proposals, they would be forwarded to the Board of Selectmen, Board of Finance, and Legislative Council for review and action, he said.

As the proposals proceed through the town review process, the financial aspects of such transactions would be disclosed, he said.

Rule Changes

Also at the March 19 session, P&Z members are slated to conduct three public hearings on proposed changes to the zoning regulations.

One proposed zoning rule change would increase the maximum developmental coverage that is allowed on building lots in certain industrial zones.

The proposed changes apply to M-1, M-2A, and M-5 (Industrial ) zones.

Under the rule change proposals, in M-1 and M-2A zones, the permitted maximum building coverage would increase from 25 percent to 35 percent, and the overall permitted coverage would increase from 50 to 70 percent. Overall coverage includes buildings, plus related features.

In the M-5 zone, the permitted maximum building coverage would increase from 30 percent to 35 percent, and the overall development coverage would increase from 60 percent to 70 percent.

Another proposed zoning rule change would revise a regulation on the sale of alcohol. The proposed rule change would eliminate an existing restriction which prohibits “cafes” that serve food from locating within 300 feet of a school or church. “Full-service restaurants” currently are allowed to locate within 300 feet of a school or church.

In a proposed zoning rule change for the Sandy Hook Design District zone (SHDD), new regulations would redefine the terms of allowing residential apartments as a use within new commercial buildings or as a use within adjacent buildings.

Such commercial/residential configurations would be allowed either as “permitted uses” or as “special permit uses,” depending upon the specifics of a project.