Five Donated Parcels Could Enhance Newtown’s

Open Space Inventory

By John Voket

Newtown is poised to take ownership of about 6.5 acres of donated land split among five parcels, several of which abut, and will enhance existing passive recreational space, according to the town’s deputy land use director. Rob Sibley told The Newtown Bee November 7, that he is in the process of reviewing the donations, as required, with Boards of Selectmen and Finance and the Legislative Council.

Mr Sibley said the financial impact of taking over the parcels has been vetted and is acceptable to Town Finance Director Robert Tait and the finance board, whose members heard preliminary information about the proposals during a recent meeting.

Mr Tait said the amount of taxes the town collects on the combination of parcels is “very small.”

Mr Sibley noted the donations provide important puzzle pieces to a growing patchwork of existing open space and other donated parcels Newtown has been acquiring over the past decade as part of a focused effort to increase its inventory of undevelopable land.

“Acquiring these will be advantageous to our open space program,” Mr Sibley said, adding that some of the donations have triggered interest from adjacent property owners who are now considering donations or other options along those lines.

The land use official said two of the parcels waiting to be received by the town are abutting, and another pledged parcel — the largest of this group — is adjacent to the existing Pole Bridge Preserve, and could add three acres to that 60-acre stretch of open space.

That and the second largest 2.6-acre parcel involve what Mr Sibley called a “lot line revisions,” where the property owners authorize donations that would enhance the town’s contiguous open space, while swapping part of another abutting residential parcel that enhances the contiguous nature of the donor’s remaining land.

According to documentation provided by Mr Sibley, outright donations include two separate parcels on Woodview Trail of 0.11 acres and 0.46 acres; a 0.4 acre lot on Riverside Road; and a 0.1 acre parcel on Hemlock Trail. The lot line revisions entail the three-acre parcel on Pole Bridge Road, and the 2.6-acre plot on Poor House Road.

Three properties in the Laurel Trail area, as well as the three-acre Pole Bridge parcel, have been recommended for acquisition, according to Mr Sibley’s report. Both comprise mature forest, and are currently surrounded by open space owned by the Newtown Forest Association. The Poor House Road plot is part mature forest and part wetland.

Mr Sibley said accepting the three-acre revision is “critical to the Pole Bridge Preserve vision.”