SEYMOUR-ANSONIA – A nonprofit has purchased the Kinneytown Dam in Seymour for the symbolic price of one dollar, bringing it one step closer to a long-anticipated demolition.
The Connecticut Brownfield Land Bank announced the purchase in a press release Nov. 11. Demolition is slated to begin in either 2027 or 2028.
“The milestone clears the path for dismantling the defunct hydroelectric facility on the Naugatuck River,” the press release states.
Public officials and environmental activists have said for years that the dam needs to come down. The dam blocks fish from accessing upstream habitats along the river and hasn’t generated power in years. Officials have also said it poses a safety risk to commuters along the Metro-North railroad line, citing a risk of flash flooding from a nearby embankment dam.
The Naugatuck Valley Council of Governments (NVCOG) and nonprofit Save the Sound have been spearheading the demolition project. The two groups have hosted bimonthly informational meetings on its progress since 2024.
The Connecticut Brownfield Land Bank helps local governments manage abandoned and contaminated sites to make them usable again, according to its website. In this case, the land bank stepped in and purchased the property to give NVCOG and Save The Sound greater control over it.
“While we had been moving ahead with initial design work while the site was under previous ownership, we ultimately needed to control the site to feel comfortable making large investments in dam removal and river restoration,” said Aaron Budris, the environmental planning director at NVCOG.
The groups are scheduled to provide an update on the project’s progress at a public community Zoom meeting at 6 p.m. Nov. 19. Registration is required. Click here for more information.
The project has secured about $50 million in public funding since 2022. Budris previously estimated the total project cost at $63 million.
The land bank’s ownership of the site will allow it to help apply for further grants. It will also shield both Seymour and Ansonia from potential liabilities connected to the project. That’s according to Rick Dunne, who is both president of the land bank and executive director at NVCOG.
“It’s a mechanism for shielding towns from liability, and other parties from liability for sites that would not otherwise get managed or developed,” Dunne said.
Dunne said the first construction phase will involve a sanitary sewer relocation in Seymour. That’s scheduled to begin in 2026, with demolition work on the dam slated to begin either in 2027 or 2028.
Dunne said the recent 44-day government shutdown has forced the timeline to be revisited, because his organizations weren’t able to communicate with the federal government during that time.
“Our EPA partners have been away,” Dunne said. “We’re delayed and getting the final phase of sediment analysis done.”
A purchase-sale agreement was originally signed between the land bank and Kinneytown Hydro Company, Inc. in January 2023. However, that sale took more than two years to close, both because of a lengthy series of needed inspections and complicated negotiations with the land owner, according to Dunne.
Dunne said the long closing period did not impact the project’s timeline. He said there’s a fair amount of work that was able to get done even with a private owner, including design and planning work along with sediment analysis.
Coe Pond Is Going Away, Executive Director Says
A 2024 environmental report revealed high levels of contamination and pollution around the dam from sources including metals, mercury, herbicides, and PFAS substances (also known as ‘forever chemicals’). The highest levels of contamination were found in Coe Pond, a manmade pond in Ansonia fed by a canal near the dam.
Although small-scale experimental technology has been deployed in hopes of absorbing some of the contamination in Coe Pond, Dunne said the bulk of it will need to be removed more traditionally. He said the pond will likely disappear as part of the project.
“There won’t be a pond, there won’t be a lake there, regardless of how it gets managed, because it is the most heavily contaminated portion of the entire project,” Dunne said.
Some nearby residents in Ansonia have protested the planned removal of Coe Pond, saying that it is being done without transparency and that local wildlife could be endangered. NVCOG officials have pointed in response to a public website which documents the project’s progress and said that the removal will restore the area to a more natural state.
Once the dam comes down, NVCOG officials have said greater riverfront access could be restored for pedestrians and businesses. It will also finally give function to a fish passage near the Tingue Dam upstream in Seymour. That passage was unveiled in 2014, but has largely proved ineffective because fish were being blocked by the Kinneytown Dam before they could even reach it.
Migratory fish, including shad and herring, will be able to swim upstream to Seymour and beyond once the dam is gone.
The Kinneytown Dam was built in 1844 to power Anson Phelps’ Copper & Brass Mill. It is some 30 feet high and spans over 400 feet across the Naugatuck River near the Seymour – Ansonia border.