Open Space Ordinance - finally passed

At the Regular Board of Alderman meeting on September 14th, the BOA failed to "repass" or over-ride the Mayor's veto of the Open Space Ordinance. After some discussion, much of it eye opening as to the lack of understanding on the issue despite two public hearings and a period of preparation for review from Mar2006 till now on the ordinance. In the end, the Mayor's proposal was passed which noted in particular that the 06/07 fiscal year will have $50,000 appropriated into the Open Space Trust Account, and that begining with the 07/08 fiscal year, the annual allocation from the annual budget into the OSTA will be $250,000.

As I said in past blog entries, I disagree with the nuance of ordinance affecting previously approved budgets, but it's time to move on as while the path to get there is different, the end result is the same as what I sought.

I will not linger any longer on past achievements and rest on those laurels. The annual amount of $250,000 will appear in the annual budget, be appropriated into the OSTA within 45 days of the start of the fiscal year, and can only be used for expenses related to Open Space acquisition as defined in the ordinance. Money from sales of property and deposited into the account are above and beyond the ordinance. Money from bonding deposited into the account is not counted. There is no longer ambiguity as to meeting the "intent" of the law. Expenses uses are defined and not ambiguous. It is time to move forward.

The Conservation Commission has numerous targeted parcels which will no doubt cost in excess of the amount that will accumulate in this restricted account, despite the additions of fines, and fees in lieu of open space land dedications at subdivision applications. The property values in Shelton will result in a need to borrow and pay for them over time as all large capital expenditures should be handled. There can be help toward that from the OSTA, but it likely will not be able to do that on it's own, just like it hasn't in the past. The OSTA is just one tool in an arsenal to prepare for acquiring open space for the benefit of Shelton.

Harriet remembered

It is with sadness that I learned of Harriet Wilber's death on Thursday Sep14th. Her dedication, consistency, and commitment to our community had a beneficial impact that will be long felt and remembered.

My father served with Harriet on the Conservation Commission back in the 1970's under Mayor Kelly's administration. My brother was the same graduating class at Shelton High School with her son.

It was Harriet who encouraged me to become involved in the Conservation Commission in 1998. A subdivision was proposed near where I live, and a resident had been going door to door to make us aware of what was happening and how it might impact us. I attended the Conservation Commission's meeting where they were addressing the application. I had no involvement or frankly paid much attention to what was going on in Shelton government, but this was something that gave me concern, so I stayed for the whole meeting to understand more about how this group operated and made decisions. Harriet recognized my surname and asked if I was Bob Harbinson's son. I said I was and she took my staying for the whole meeting as having a "real" interest, saying that there was an open position if I was interested in joining. I thought about it and came to the understanding (after observing a few more meetings) that if I wanted to be part of the community I live in, I had to be involved, and not just because something was "in my back yard".

I came on the Commission in 1998 and learned an awful lot from Harriet and her co-chair Terry Jones over the years, eventually becoming co-chair with Harriet through to the present day. As her health was failing, and she found it difficult to participate, she wanted the best for the Commission's operation and had sent in a letter of resignation so that we could have a full slate of able volunteers. The Mayor would not accept it, as he felt she is too important to Shelton's Conservation efforts and that we would wait till she got back to full-strength and could rejoin us. Sadly, that didn't come to pass.

Harriet had been recognized over the years with several awards for her work, specifically with Conservation issues. One of them was the "Woman of Substance" recognition in Shelton. Our community has lost a real woman of substance. She will be missed, but I will fondly remember her for years to come.

Ct Post 2006/Sep/13 article on Aspen Ridge

The article in today's Ct Post had a number of reported comments that do demand a response. To begin with, there is necessary some common understanding which the article likely did not cover due to space limitations.

The subject area being referenced is three separate parcels of land owned by two separate parties (one party owns 2 of the parcels). It is located behind Blockbuster Video along Commerce Drive. There are currently two single family homes on the subject area, one of which I understand is occupied, and one of which is currently not as the owner decided not to continue renting it to tenants in anticipation of the property's development. They share a common driveway and access via a paper street (Old Mill Rd) between Blockbuster Video and the FarMill River onto Bridgeport Ave. (Note: A paper street is one that exists on paper legally as a city street yet not commonly used as such. Usually they are unimproved paths from long ago.) The subject area is adjacent to land preserved by the Shelton Land Conservation Trust both to the upstream and downstream boundaries, and the Far Mill River on the northern boundary. The Far Mill River is a Greenway corridor identified on the City of Shelton's Open Space Plan for special attention toward open space preservation.

A developer approached the owners of the three parcels, negotiated and obtained an option agreement (typically a private and exclusive agreement to purchase the property at a future date once application approvals are obtained), and then applied to the Planning and Zoning Commission toward his goal.

The development proposal was 2 concurrent applications under the PDD (Planned Development District) mechanism, a method that has come under increased scrutiny by the community, especially when used for residential development. PDD's are unique unto each one approved in respect to what it outlines. (The PDD for Shelton Square is different than the PDD of R.D. Scinto's Enterprise Park for example). Because of this zone designation's individualistic nature and the inability of adjacent property owners to have an expectation as to the outcome of such a zone mechanism that could dramatically affect their property values, a PDD can only occur in areas that our outlined as "Special Development Areas" or SDA's. An SDA is an overlay on the zoning map and not a change to the underlying zoning. Thus in this case, there was an application to apply an SDA to the subject area, and a second application, concurrently, to apply a PDD with it's specific proposition to the proposed SDA.

I have personally said many times before that such concurrent applications should not be accepted. There is an assumption with the PDD application that there will be an approval for an SDA. This is a mixing of planning and development proposals. Planning should occur with holistic thinking of impact on the municipality, it should not occur as an outcome of a proposal for development. Planning should be preperatory, not reactionary.

The Conservation Commission gives commentary on applications for development, and you can read it for this application via this hyperlink.

Rather than a hyperlink to the CtPost article which may not work in the future, I show it here along with my commentary in red:

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City criticized for failing to buy riverfront land
KATE RAMUNNI, Correspondent

SHELTON — Two Planning and Zoning Commission members say the city missed an important opportunity when it did not buy property along the Far Mill River that will now be developed into condominiums. I do not know of what "important opportunity to buy the property" the two members are referencing. The correspondent on this article reported on Jun14 in the CtPost the following: "The commission should determine how many units would be allowed on the property", Sylvester said, "so the fair market value can be set. Then the city should make an offer".

The commission this week approved Lava Real Estate's plans for condominiums off Bridgeport Avenue, behind Blockbuster Video. Initially the developer proposed building 16 units on the 2.5-acre site, but the commission reduced that number to 12. This approval required a zone overlay as a Special Development Area. It then required a zone change to a Planned Development District. All of those actions and approvals by the Planning & Zoning Commission are supposed to work in concert with the planning documents they have approved for the subject area such as the Rte 8 Corridor Study and the Plan of Conservation & Development. Both those planning documents identified this as an important area for preservation as open space. The PDD method gives the Planning & Zoning Commission great latitude and they could have approved only 8 units if they desired, or less or more. The ambiguity of the unknown and lack of consistency is what concerns the residents of Shelton in regard to use of the PDD regulations for development in town.

The application drew the objections of a number of residents who voiced fears that the development would add traffic, congestion and pollution to the area. Any development would add those elements to the area. The more appropriate question is would they be impacting to the area in such a degree that the proposal should not be approved. Apparently the Planning & Zoning Commission believes unanimously that the impacts of 12 units on this parcel don't rise to that level. I would disagree. I believe their own planning documents would disagree.

The city would have been better off buying the land, commissioners Leon J. Sylvester and Daniel Orazietti said. This past tense statement is directly in contrast to Mr. Sylvester's quote in the Jun14 CtPost where he projected the future in saying that the development should be approved with a determined unit count to help set the price of acquisition. That statement was the definition of prejudicing a vote. It needs to be said that the Conservation Commission has traditionally looked at open or natural landscape lands to acquire for City Open Space. This subject area had 2 separate property owners owning 3 separate parcels that had 2 separate resident dwelling units, both of which were recently occupied. As the community experiences more of these "tear-downs" for re-development resulting in loss of what is "perceived open space", especially with oversized lots, and in particular greenway corridors such as this, the Conservation Commission will have to consider them also as possible targets for acquisition toward City Open Space.

"I feel very strongly that this property should have been purchased by the city," Sylvester said. "It is a beautiful piece of property, and I think the city is making a big mistake letting it go."
"It is great open space. I don't understand what they are thinking," Orazietti said, referring to the Conservation Commission and the Board of Aldermen, both of which declined to pursue a purchase. The Conservation Commission gave a summary on this subject area, however I can not comment on discussions held in "executive session" but offer the following: as is typical for developers submitting applications, the property at the current time could not be "purchased" as the owners had exclusive option agreements with the developer/applicant. The owners are precluded from selling it to another party. The City does have the option to enact an eminent domain proceeding and "acquire" the property by siezing if for a stated public purpose.

"They had no interest in the property," Planning and Zoning Commission Chairman Allan J. Cribbins said. "Based on the recommendation of the Conservation Commission, the Board of Aldermen found it was not a priority," Zoning Administrator Rick Schultz said. "They are more interested in the larger parcels." The ConsComm didn't previous to the application have a "targeting" interest in acquiring these specific parcels. As previously mentioned we have traditionally been looking at parcels with natural landscape for open space acquisitions, not properties that are primarily homes or costly properties in commercial areas. That should not take away from the fact that we still have an interest in the Greenway corridor as an important area to preserve not only through acquisition of land by purchase, but via open space set-asides from subdivisions and conditions of approval for development. That has been stated in our Open Space Plan and the two afore mentioned planning documents of the Planning & Zoning Commission. The PDD mechanism undertaken by the developer allows great latitude by the Planning & Zoning Commisison in it's approval statement. It was the Planning & Zoning's unanimous decision as to the amount of development intensity approved as well as the amount of open space and the location of it within this development's application area. I can not comment as to what our letter said to the Board of Alderman regarding acquisition, but can publicly say that simply the size of a parcel, no matter where it is located in town, does not solely dictate the concern for it to become or remain as open space.

But it is the smaller pieces — and especially ones along a waterway — that need to be preserved, Sylvester charged. Mr. Sylvester can posture his comments, but he can't have it both ways. If his concern was to protect this area along the waterway, then he should not have voted for the development as approved. Instead, he should have made the claim as to the amount of open space that should be required for this PDD zone referencing the Open Space Plan and the application's location in the identified Far Mill River Greenway, his Commission's Rte8 Corridor Study, and the recently adopted Plan of Conservation and Development.

Lava Real Estate's property is bordered by open space owned by the Shelton Land Trust.
"We need to have a lot more recognition of the importance of land along the waterways," Sylvester said, adding that he does not believe such properties are adequately addressed in the city's Plan of Development. "This is a perfect example of why people feel things are getting overdeveloped — we take this pristine piece of property and allow it to be developed, and we are missing the boat here." I don't know how Mr. Sylvestor defines pristine, but it does make a good sound bite to a reporter and panders to a large audience that was in attendance that night. I don't want to diminish the value of conserving the character of the land in this area, but to say that an area of properties with 2 homes and a barn behind a Blockbuster Video is "pristine" is a mis-characterization. There is no question that it is a pretty spot. It is in a greenway corridor. It is riverfront property and the City Engineer's issued a negative letter given the proximity to the 100yr flood plain area. The Inland Wetlands Commission has not yet given an opinion on the concept either. All this raises the question that if it is so important to conserve open space on this area, why did the Planning & Zoning Commission vote unanimously to approve the application?

"Here is another lost opportunity," said Nancy Steiner, a member of the citizens group We R-1. "The people of Shelton spoke about the need to preserve this open space, and here the commission had a choice and didn't do it. It is very, very disappointing to think that these boards and commissions hear what the people say and don't act on it." Such public sentiment does not fall on deaf ears at the Conservation Commission. All members of boards and commissions that make these decisions need to be held more accountable for their actions or lack there-of. Reporting of these events is unfortunately not as thorough as could be conducted. I sleep peacefully knowing that there is no member of the Conservation Commission hearing applications involving former co-workers and earning family income off residential development and building in Shelton.
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Email, Functional Communication, and FOI.

Although this is my personal blog and used to comment efficiently to the media, I feel important to promote knowledge of the following process being adopted by the Conservation Commision:

The Conservation Commissioners all have email for sending and receiving messages. It is a mandatory communication tool to function in the 21st century. Email:

• Efficiently communicates text messages, pictures, video, and sound - avoiding postage, printing, and recording cost to user and recipient.
• Is not geographically dependent. A user can be at work in NYC, on vacation overseas, or at home in Shelton. The cost is the same.
• Is not time dependent. A user can retrieve or review messages during work hours, late at night, or on weekends. It promotes efficient use of time.

Email communication is also something poorly addressed by the Freedom of Information Act.

• A message sent to a recipient list that is a quorom of a public agency constitutes a "meeting" and is subject to the FOI regs.
• FOI regulations in part require advance posted notice of a meeting, the ability to attend a meeting, and the ability to review the minutes of a meeting.
• The FOI Commission for Ct. proposed a draft ruling in 2004 after several years of delays. They have yet to make any declarative ruling on the issue and judge complaints on a case by case basis.

The Conservation Commission believes in open government. We have never had a Freedom of Information complaint. We are making use of a beta process as a trailblazing method of how our mandatory need to use email can reconcile with the FOI regs.

1. There are free internet services that provide an automated method to "post" or "publish" messages of a group sent via email on webpages of the internet. The service reviewed and tested by the Commission will have messages received by the service posted within 10 seconds, and archived indefinately. This "groups" service creates a "virtual" arena for holding an email meeting publicly. NOTE: This satisfies the need to have minutes of an email meeting.
2. The "groups" service provider has an additional "alerts" service which will send a notice to any communication device when new messages are added to the "groups" service. NOTE: This satisfies the need to allow public attendance of an email meeting. It should be noted that depending upon when a commissioner reads emails mirrored through the "groups" service, the public may be reading content before a Commissioner does.
3. Internet access is becoming widespread, either via home, work or public facilities such as libraries. Additionally phone devices are becoming connected to the internet. The "groups" service requires no registration by those who want to view messages and/or discussions. The messages within the "groups" service are available for research through major search engines. NOTE: This satisfies public accessibility to the "virtual meeting"

To satisfy the concerns expressed in the FOI draft regulations, and still allow Commissioner use of the email communication tool, the following policy is being adopted effective Sept6th.

1. The Conservation Commission considers email communications amongst a quorom of members that discuss or may generate discussion of Commission work to be a "virtual meeting". Discussion is not restricted to messages that receive replies, it includes messages sent by a member as a simple statement regarding Commission activities to a quorom of members without expectation of a reply.
2. The Conservation Commission will publish "virtual meeting" content in a timely, accessible, and archived state using the groups service of google. Our groups address is -http://groups.google.com/group/sheltoncc
3. Only Commissioners can join our group created within the group service offered by google. Membership then allows, and it is the responsibility of each member to ensure, posting of messages related to Conservation business that is intended to reach a quorom.
4. The service allows public viewing in real-time of posted messages without registration or cost. It does not allow public comment via posting of messages which is restricted to members only.
5. The group service can provide alerts to users who have interest in timely notification of when new messages are posted within our group. This alerts service can be customized to be any message within the group, or any messages related to a specific subject matter within the group. This alert service can be sent to multiple types of electronic devices. Instructions for setting an "alert service" are provided at www.groups.google.com
6. There is inability to determine the time at which a Commssioner as a member of the group may read a message that created a "virtual meeting". In fact, public via the previously mentioned alerts service may view a message before a commissioner sees it. This time-shifting for a "virtual meeting" creates an inability to have uniform and timely review of a discussion as in a physical meeting. As such, while the FOI rules may view a "quorom" that eventually reads messages as creating a "meeting", not everyone is "attending" at the same time. Because of this virtual nature, no motions or actions can be made at a virtual meeting. The groups service is not a chat room type service where all are present at the same time.
7. Each agenda of the Conservation Commission will bring attention to the fact that "virtual meetings" via emails may occur from time to time and that they should be considered "special meetings". It will also be noted for the City Clerk to post details regarding these vitual meetings in order to meet legal posting requirements of "special meetings".