IWC Hearing Slated For Firehouse Proposal

By Andrew Gorosko

The Inland Wetlands Commission (IWC) has scheduled a public hearing for September 8 on Newtown Hook & Ladder Company, Inc, #1’s proposal to construct a firehouse at 12 Sugar Street (Route 302).

IWC members this week set that hearing date after receiving a petition signed by more than 30 residents requesting such a public hearing. About half of the petition signers live in the vicinity of the 12 Sugar Street site.

Hook & Ladder, which is one of the town’s five volunteer fire companies, has submitted an application to the IWC for a wetlands/watercourses protection permit as part of its proposal to construct a 11,414-square-foot firehouse.

The 9.4-acre site is on the north side of Sugar Street, northwest of Sugar Street’s intersection with Elm Drive. The site lies 950 feet west of the major intersection of Sugar Street, Main Street, Glover Avenue, and South Main Street.

Under the proposal, the Borough of Newtown Land Trust, Inc, and the R. Scudder Smith Family Partnership would donate land to create the site for the firehouse. The property has extensive wetlands. The undeveloped site is lightly wooded and contains heavy undergrowth. The property has R-1 (Residential) and B-½ (Business) zoning.

In an August 10 letter to IWC Chairman Anne Peters, attorney Catherine Cuggino of the Chipman, Mazzucco, Land & Pennarola law firm of Danbury, writes that she represents Francois and Natalie deBrantes of 13 Sugar Street, who submitted the petition in seeking a public hearing on the firehouse application.

In August 2009, the Borough Zoning Board of Appeals (BZBA) unanimously rejected the fire company’s request for a zoning variance for 12 Sugar Street for firehouse construction. That action came amid stiff neighborhood opposition to granting a zoning variance to allow the fire company to build a firehouse closer to the street than the zoning regulations would normally allow.

The fire company had sought a zoning variance from the BZBA to allow it to construct a firehouse that would be set back 20 feet from 12 Sugar Street property’s front boundary line. The normal minimum setback distance in that area is 50 feet. The fire company had sought that variance in view of the extensive wetlands on the site.

In their motion to reject the requested zoning variance, BZBA members cited three basic reasons for turning down the application. They decided that a firehouse would not be in harmony with the general character of the residential neighborhood; the presence of a firehouse and its related fire vehicle traffic would create traffic hazards in the congested area; and that a firehouse’s presence would damage property values in the neighborhood.

Although Hook & Ladder does not need a zoning variance for the current proposal, it would need Borough Zoning Commission (BZC) approval for a site development plan.

The Police Commission, acting as the local traffic authority, in June unanimously endorsed a traffic study on the firehouse project prepared for Hook & Ladder by Frederick P. Clark Associates, Inc.