After spending six years trying to find the soft spot in the resolve of Newtown’s land use agencies to protect the public health and safety in the center of Sandy Hook, a Danbury developer finally found what he was looking for on June 1, not in Newtown, but in a New Britain courtroom of the Connecticut Superior Court. Judge Lois Tanzer cleared the way for developer Guri Dauti’s 26-unit Edona Commons condominium complex on 4.5 rugged acres at 95 and 99 Church Hill Road. She ordered the town’s Water and Sewer Authority (WSA) to approve the sewer service to a site that failed to comply with the minimum requirements of the WSA’s regulations and instructing the Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) to adopt a set of “zoning regulations” proposed by the developer that were in essence a description of the idiosyncratic site he wanted to develop.

The proposed condominium project in its various incarnations over the years always fell far short of the minimum standards of Newtown’s zoning regulations because it tried to do too much with too little. It was plain to zoning officials and townspeople alike that the intensive use of the rugged, sloping site would overwhelm the capacity of not only its 4.5 acres, but also Sandy Hook Center itself.

Yet, the ace up Mr Gauti’s sleeve has always been the “affordable housing” component of his plan. Eight of the planned 26 units would be priced lower than the others, qualifying the project for special consideration under the state’s Affordable Housing Land Use Appeals Act. That law allows developers who feel aggrieved by a town’s insistence on strict development standards to appeal to state courts for consideration under the relaxed standards of the affordable housing appeals law. The act instructs the courts to disregard all local zoning standards that are not directly tied to public health and safety. Even with the bar lowered for Mr Dauti’s appeal, local officials were confident that the environmental and public safety threats inherent in the Edona Commons were so egregious that the appeal would fail. Judge Tanzer’s ruling came as a great disappointment and surprise.

The Affordable Housing Land Use Appeals Act was designed to combat arbitrary exclusionary zoning by which wealthy towns imposed a de facto system of social engineering. Unfortunately, it has been used in this instance against a town committed both in its Town Plan of Conservation and Development and in practice to providing housing opportunities to people of modest means. The Planning and Zoning Commission does have a set of affordable housing regulations. Another developer used those regulations to quickly win approval of another condominium project less than a mile from Edona Commons’ site that provided an even higher percentage of affordable housing units.

With the help of a $50,000 state grant, the Planning and Zoning Commission is also reviewing its affordable housing policies and regulations and working to identify local sites suitable for such high-density development. It is not that Newtown is averse to affordable housing; it is averse to development that degrades both the environment and the quality life of all its citizens regardless of their economic status. It is not a matter of rich or poor; it is a matter of health and safety.

We support the decisions by the P&Z and WSA to appeal this court ruling, and we urge state legislators to review the provisions of the state’s affordable housing appeals act to ensure that in the future it is not abused in a way that punishes towns that are working in good faith to address the housing needs of all of its citizens.