Newtown Weighs Eminent Domain To Secure Well Drilling Site

By John Voket

A defunct nonprofit lake association may be the only thing standing between a small state utility and its ability to deliver a refreshing, ample supply of water to homeowners in the Riverside/Alpine neighborhood of Sandy Hook. On Monday, the Board of Selectmen heard from Health Director Donna Culbert, Land Use Director George Benson and town attorney David Grogins about what the attorney deemed a public “health crisis.”

The slowly deteriorating water capacity issue in the area, which encompasses many converted seasonal homes and at least one more recently developed subdivision, came to the attention of the Health District in 2007. During a dry period last summer, Ms Culbert said the utility serving the area had to truck supplemental water supplies in from Danbury to ensure all its customers had enough for basic use.

“I heard from the residents down there many times,” Ms Culbert told The Bee following the meeting. The private utility, the Olmstead Water Supply Company, Inc of Thomaston, operates similar well and water delivery functions in other communities.

To date most of the wells serving the community are under-performing or are no longer providing water. Ms Culbert said some existing wells are barely producing a half-gallon per minute, while by comparison, she said an ideal flow should meet or exceed seven gallons per minute for an average household.

The health director said the subsurface conditions in the area are part of the challenge, and told selectmen that Olmstead crews sank an 850-foot deep well on one of the last remaining parcels the company has access to in the area and was only able to develop a three-quarters of a gallon per minute flow.

That leaves a roughly one-acre parcel remaining that is configured with enough clearance from neighboring private wells and septic systems to try and drill an on-site well. Ms Culbert admitted that even if the town helps acquire access to the parcel for drilling, that the attempt might be futile.

In that case, the next option would be to drill at an adjacent off-site location and pipe water into the existing system. Under state statutes, Ms Culbert said, the cost to create that new well and delivery system would be borne by all users of the local system, a scenario she sees as the last resort.

So she asked selectmen Monday, along with the town attorney, to consider allowing the initiation of one of two means to acquire the one-acre parcel.

“We have two alternatives,” Mr Grogins told the selectmen. “We could foreclose on the property because there are about $11,000 in back taxes owed, or we could take the property under the power of eminent domain for the health and welfare of that community.

“The attempt would be to help the citizens (of that area) — who are citizens of Newtown with what is essentially a health crisis in that area,” Mr Grogins added.

Ms Culbert said that low water yield may not have been a concern to transient summer guests who stayed at what were once just seasonal cottages, because they supplemented drinking water supplies from wells with lake water pumped from the shore to homes for other uses. In regards to accessing the parcel under consideration for well drilling, which sits at the northwestern corner of Alpine Drive and Bancroft Road, the health director said ideally acquiring an easement to drill would provide the most expeditious solution.

But since the association has an identified surviving legal representative, Mr Grogins said there is someone who can be served to answer to the eminent domain claim.

During the meeting, Mr Grogins suggested that by taking not only the land for the proposed well drilling, but also the roads serving the community, formerly identified as the Riverside on Lake Zoar Association — a nonprofit corporation, the town may accomplish dual goals. If the initiative moves forward, the action may help by providing a new water source for residents, and a way to clarify the rights of residents to pass across strips of land that are identified as roads on paper.

The land agency is involved in an attempt to define the status of private roadways throughout the town, some of which are thought to be deeded to property owners, or groups like the defunct lake association in question. Mr Benson explained that while some of these roads only exist on paper, the town has the obligation to maintain any passable roads with three or more residences by plowing and providing access to traffic.

“We don’t want to get into the situation we have in other communities, where people have bought these roads, and we have had (poor) cooperation from them in terms of making the repairs we want to make,” Mr Grogins said. “As part of this process, we could take the roads also. We wouldn’t make them town roads but we would continue to maintain them and provide access to the people who live on them.”

Ms Culbert said the initial request to identify an owner of the parcel in question came from Mr Black at the Olmstead water company, but the attempt to track any individual tied to the lake association involved the land use office, the health district, the tax collector and assessor. Mr Black did not respond to a call for comment before The Bee went to press April 24.

The selectmen will now have to consider the request to initiate either the foreclosure, or the eminent domain action.