Some Suggestions

For Queen Street

(The Bee has received for publication the following open letter to the Board of Selectmen.)

At last Monday night’s town meeting, the citizens of Newtown voted to authorize the Board of Selectmen to sell the Queen Street property. Mr Rosenthal explained that the method of disposing of the property would be decided by the Board of Selectmen. Many residents, including myself, shared our thoughts on how the property should be sold. At the conclusion of the meeting, Mr Rosenthal invited me to share my suggestions in writing. As one of the suggestions was that there should be a public hearing to determine the method of selling the property, I have chosen to present my suggestions in an open letter to our Board of Selectmen. I encourage all interested citizens of Newtown to share their thoughts as well.

The Queen Street property was bought for two reasons; the first was to provide the town with a possible site for municipal offices and a possible fire station. The second was to control what would be developed on that property, and especially to avoid high-density development. With the purchase of the Fairfield Hills campus, the first reason no longer exists, and so the time has come to dispose of the property in a manner that is most beneficial to Newtown.

The first thing that we need to consider is: what do we want Queen Street to look like after we no longer control it? Do we want large houses or small houses, do we want colonial style or anything goes? Doe we want to generate lots of property taxes or doe we want to have houses that don’t add children to the school system? Do we want to put the houses on every existing lot and obscure the view or do we want to cluster the homes and preserve as much view as possible? Before any sale commences we must have a vision for the property.

Next we need to know how we are going to sell the property. Mr Rosenthal indicated that he thought the selectmen would sell the properties using a live auction. When you sell by auction, you can’t have the sale contingent on someone getting a mortgage; they must guarantee that they can perform. Are we prepared to exclude people that don’t have deep pockets, or are we going to sell the properties below market value? Are we going to offer any guarantees? Without at least a Phase I (a professional’s statement regarding any environmental issues), people are going to be reluctant to make an unconditional high offer.

A decision needs to be made whether we should try to make as much money as possible on the sale of the property. In today’s market, a choice lot in Newtown can exceed $200,000. Certainly with the views that the property affords and its desirable location in town, it would seem reasonable to try to obtain the best return. A sound strategy would be to engage a professional appraiser to determine the property’s worth.

The next step would be to see if the existing houses are worth selling in an “as is” condition. We know that they are out of code, some have been vandalized and all suffer from extensive deterioration due to neglect. It is possible that we could make more money on a lot where we paid to have the house removed, rather than selling the homes in their “as is” condition. Furthermore, selling the homes in their “as is” condition does not guarantee that a buyer will complete the renovations as we may expect. We could potentially end up with new eyesores that we have no control over. Also, if the homes are not properly renovated it could adversely affect the value of the surrounding properties, which could yield a much lower return to the town.

Serious consideration should be given to hiring an engineer to resubdivide the property. The current layout of the lots may not be the most advantageous. We should also consider clustering the houses to retain as much of the view as possible. As long as we control the whole property, we should decide on the best placement for the houses. This is simply known as planning.

If we want to do a thorough job we should consider alternate developments as well. One possibility is building age-restricted housing. Not just the type of housing permitted under EH-10, but upscale housing as well. Age restricted means that one of the owners has to be 55 years or older, it definitely does not mean infirm. What it does mean is property taxes and no children. One good reason to consider Queen Street for age restricted housing is that it puts our seniors within walking distance of the center of town rather than placing them at the furthest point from the center.

The Legislative Council and town citizens imposed a major task on our selectmen. We should not proceed without a plan, like we did on the Amaral property. There we ended up with a million dollar ball field built on the side of a hill. If we want this street to turn out properly, our selectmen will need to put on the dreaded developer’s hat and prepare a plan. And just like a developer, present that plan to the public at a public hearing to make sure that we have a consensus. Our selectmen will be leaving us a legacy; hopefully it will be one that we will be proud of.

Respectfully,

Kim J. Danziger

5 Stonewall Ridge Road, Newtown     August 22, 2001