Developer Gains Wetlands Permit For 54-Unit Condo Complex

By Andrew Gorosko

Following their review of scaled-down plans for an age-restricted condominium complex proposed for Oakview Road, Conservation Commission members have unanimously granted a wetlands permit for the 54-unit project.

On August 24, Conservation Commission members, acting as the town’s wetlands protection agency, voted to approve Toll Brothers, Inc’s, proposal for Regency at Newtown, a project intended for people over age 55 on a 51-acre site at 21 Oakview Road, near Newtown High School. The development proposal still requires several other town land use approvals.

Voting in favor of the wetlands application were Chairman Sally O’Neil, Wesley Gillingham, Dr Philip Kotch, Jane Nickerson, and Jeffrey Ritter. Member Donald Collier did not attend the session.

On July 13, the commission had voted 4-to-1 to reject Toll Brothers’ proposal for a 59-unit condo complex.

In their earlier rejection of the 59-unit proposal, commission members had voiced concerns about the proximity of some proposed condo units to the top edge of the steep slopes that lead downward to the Pootatuck River, which is a spawning area for brook trout. Commission members’ concerns involved those slopes’ general stability in relation to the proposed condo construction atop them, as well as the prospect for stormwater draining down those excavated slopes and carrying sediment into the Pootatuck River, thus contaminating the trout stream.

The revised development plans move the proposed condo construction away from the top edge of those steep slopes, thus decreasing the prospect of environmental problems.

Following the commission’s rejection of the 59-unit project, Toll Brothers, represented by attorney Robert Hall, sued the Conservation Commission in Danbury Superior Court in seeking to have a judge force the commission to issue a wetlands permit for the 59-unit proposal.

After that court appeal was filed, Toll Brothers then submitted a revised development application to the Conservation Commission, which scaled down the project to 54 units and addressed the various environmental concerns raised by commission members.

On August 24, several Conservation Commission members took exception with allegations stated in that lawsuit that questioned their competency to evaluate the technical aspects of the 59-unit proposal.

The issue of whether the proposed construction of 59 condos would significantly adversely affect the river is a “technically complex” issue which is “beyond the knowledge of the lay members of the commission,” according to the court appeal filed on behalf of Toll Brothers. “The commission did not retain any person with professional training or experience to give it guidance and advice in reviewing the [developer’s] application,” according to the appeal.

The lawsuit states that commission members do not have the training and experience necessary to analyze the proposal on technical grounds, but nonetheless criticized it on technical grounds. If any commission members have such technical backgrounds, it was not publicly stated, according to the court appeal.

Mr Ritter said August 24 that he was offended by the developer’s allegation that commission members are not capable of reviewing development plans concerning wetlands. Commission members have technical backgrounds that enable them to review such development designs, he said.

Ms Nickerson said she found the questioning of the commission members’ competence to be “offensive.”

Ms O’Neil said commission members are well versed and trained in regulating development near wetlands for the sake of environmental protection.

“When we hear that we’re incompetent, it really makes it difficult for us to get good volunteers [for commission membership], because why should they put up with that,” Ms O’Neil said.

An August 5 account of the Toll Brothers’ court appeal of the commission’s rejection of the 59-unit development proposal in The Newtown Bee had listed the developer’s various complaints about the commission’s action.

At the August 24 session, Dr Kotch made a motion to approve the 54-unit version of Regency at Newtown, listing many conditions on that approval.

As commission members were about to vote on the motion, Ms O’Neil sought to confirm that Toll Brothers’ pending lawsuit against the commission over its rejection 59-unit version of the project would be withdrawn when the approval for the 54-unit project was granted.

“We will withdraw the lawsuit as soon as this action [approval] becomes final,” Mr Hall told commission members. The lawyer said that the wetlands permit approval for the 54-unit project might be challenged in court by someone and the developer would not withdraw its pending lawsuit until the appeal period on the wetlands permit approval had expired. The appeal period ends on September 16.

The developer now needs zoning rule amendments from the Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) to allow its architectural design to be built; a special exception to the zoning regulations from the P&Z; a site development plan approval from the P&Z; an aquifer protection approval from the P&Z, based on an aquifer protection review conducted by the Conservation Commission; and a municipal sewer connection.

Regency At Newtown would be similar to Toll Brothers’ Regency Meadows at Trumbull, an age-restricted multifamily complex on Route 25 in the Tashua section of Trumbull, just north of Route 25’s intersection with Route 111.