Town Plan Update—

P&Z Reviews

Community Facilities Planning

By Andrew Gorosko

Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) members are reviewing the role of various community facilities with an eye toward making recommendations on how those facilities should be maintained and improved in the coming decade in light of expected future changes to the town.

P&Z members are considering the proposed text of a wide-ranging 24-page report on community facilities planned to be included in the ongoing update of the 2004 Town Plan of Conservation and Development.

The panel is expected to discuss the facilities report when it meets at 7:30 pm on Thursday, August 2, at Newtown Municipal Center, 3 Primrose Street. P&Z Chairman Lilla Dean has asked that P&Z members be prepared to recommend any changes to the community facilities report at that session.

“The provision of municipal infrastructure and community facilities is one of the primary functions of town government,” according to the document.

Among the town’s major facilities are its public school buildings.

The school system’s student population reached a plateau of 5,277 students in the 2011-12 school year, according to the report.

“The past large increase in student enrollment necessitated several school improvement and expansion projects…The Board of Education school enrollment projection is a slow decline for the foreseeable future and no new educational facilities are required for the next ten years,” the planning document states.

The town has seven public schools. There are three private schools and 17 private preschool programs.

The community facilities report notes the many local park and recreational facilities. The town has significantly expanded its recreational facilities and activities during the past 30 years to keep pace with population growth and with changing recreational desires in the community, according to the P&Z.

Until now, the town has concentrated its recreational resources at large centralized locations. When funding becomes available, the town should review creating relatively small parks throughout town, known as “pocket parks,” to serve the residents of various neighborhoods, the report states.

The report also addresses facilities for senior citizens.

While in the past senior centers were basically social and recreational facilities, they have evolved to become bases for providing a variety of informational and social services to their users.

The town’s population of people who are age 60 and older increased by 62.5 percent from 2000 to 2010, and the population of people between ages 55 and 59 increased by 44.9 percent during that time period, indicating continued growth in those age categories, according to the P&Z.

 The town has a senior citizens center at 14 Riverside Road. A new senior center planned for Fairfield Hills has been listed on the town’s capital improvement program for the 2016-17 fiscal year, according to the P&Z.

The wide-ranging community facilities report addresses many other subjects, including the town’s two sanitary sewers systems, the six aquifers that provide potable water to individual properties and to water supply companies, fire protection, emergency medical services, police protection, law enforcement, the public library, town roads, public works, and solid waste disposal.

When completed, the report on community facilities will be included in the updated town plan. Although the town has until 2014 to complete that plan, P&Z members are seeking to publish the document by the end of this year.

The town plan is an advisory document that provides the P&Z with general guidance in its decisionmaking. P&Z approvals or rejections of land use applications typically state whether a given application respectively adheres to or diverges from the tenets of the town plan when P&Z members state their reasons for a decision.

The current town plan addresses a broad range of issues facing the town, including: community character, conservation, natural resources, open space, housing, economic development, community facilities, and transportation. The document lists a wide variety of planning goals for the town.