Last month, at just 24 years of age, Alyssa Thibault moved into her recently built home at 67 Summit St. in Derby.
After a year of searching, it was the perfect spot — a quiet, dead-end street on top of a steep hill, isolated by rock outcroppings and abundant evergreen trees.
It was a dream come true for Thibault — until someone knocked on her door and told her the Regional Water Authority wants to build a 2 million water storage tank atop the mountain next to her home.
“They are talking about turning a quiet residential street into an industrial rock-crushing operation,” Thibault said. “How is this happening?”
Thibault was the last of 18 people who spoke against the Regional Water Authority’s plans during a public hearing Tuesday in front of the Derby Planning and Zoning Commission. Three people representing either the Derby Fire Department or Griffin Hospital spoke in favor of the tank, saying west Derby’s decrepit water system puts the public at risk.
After a three-hour meeting, the commission elected to keep the public hearing open until its next meeting in February. They also asked Regional Water to provide a report detailing why they want to put the tank on “Telescope Mountain” instead of another spot near Hull Street and Silver Hill Road in Ansonia.
Regional Water wants to build the 10,613-square-foot tank on 2.7 acres off Mountain Street on the aforementioned “Telescope Mountain.” The project involves blasting into the mountain’s rock outcroppings, removing some 13,000 cubic yards of rock — 6,000 cubic yards of which would be processed on site with rock crushers and used in construction.
The video below provides a description of the project by Brian Robillard, Regional Water’s project manager.
Removing the rock will involve blasting for an estimated three to four weeks and the use of at least 750 trucks. The project also calls for an access road to be built off Summit Street, a road so steep and narrow that garbage trucks have to back down it during weekly pickups, according to Derby Board of Aldermen President Barbara DeGennaro.
A 1,340-foot, 16-inch water main would be installed to connect the tank to Derby’s water pipes.
Regional Water has an option to buy the land, which is owned by Shelton-based Summit Hill LLC, if the tank proposal is approved by Derby officials.
Summit Hill LLC has the same Shelton address as the John J. Brennan Construction Company.
Sharlene McEvoy, an Emmett Avenue resident, spearheaded the neighborhood opposition. She was accompanied by an attorney and an environmental consultant.
Her attorney, Keith Ainsworth, said there are 16 reasons to deny the application, all of which have to do with Derby zoning rules.
McEvoy submitted a petition she said was signed by more than 140 people urging the commission to reject the project. She lambasted the application, saying Regional Water Authority was essentially asking to build a quarry on top of hundreds of residential homes.
The water tank would be “a carbuncle on the face of the west side of Derby,” she said.
“Wherever you look from Derby you are going to be able to see this thing sticking up from the mountain,” she said.
McEvoy said the blasting and rock crushing would result in two years of neighborhood suffering during construction.
Watch the video at the top of this story for McEvoy’s complete remarks.
Other neighbors worried about dust from the rock-crushing operation, wildlife that lives atop the mountain, and who, if anyone, would profit from the removal and off-site processing of crushed rock.
“The project is best characterized as a mining operation,” said Steven Danzer, of Connecticut Wetlands Consulting, who accompanied McEvoy to the public hearing and presented his own environmental report to the commission.
Betty Lally, of Emmett Avenue, said the project is wholly inappropriate for such an old and established Derby neighborhood.
“This project should be stopped immediately,” she said.
Regional Water representatives said they looked at about 20 other sites west of the Naugatuck River and near Griffin Hospital. Telescope Mountain is the best option, they said.
The utility company employees said Derby’s water pipes are old and subject to breaks. Because there is no storage tank on the west side of the city, every time a water main breaks somewhere, water becomes discolored, pressure is lost — and the system can run out of water. Griffin Hospital is particularly vulnerable, as are Derby’s fire hydrants.
There are storage tanks that feed Derby’s west side, but they are four to five miles away from Griffin Hospital, which Regional Water considers the “heart of the distribution system.”
“If you have a main break or a fire flow or another emergency, the water from those tanks has to travel 4.5 miles to get to that location, through an older distribution system and through smaller diameter piping,” said Stephen Rupar, a senior manager and engineer with Regional Water.
“It loses pressure along the way and it loses its flow capacity,” he said.
Watch the video below for more remarks from Rupar. Story continues below the video.
Both Derby Fire Commissioner Kelly Curtis and Derby Fire Department Chief Thomas Lenart Jr. said a water storage tank is needed to bolster fire safety in Derby.
“I feel for these people for where this tank is going, but this is progress and I think the city needs it bad,” Curtis said.
Patrick Charmel, president and CEO of Griffin Hospital, submitted a letter and spoke in person at Tuesday’s public hearing. He said a water storage tank is needed to protect patients at the hospital.
The loss of water pressure in the hospital wreaks havoc inside Griffin, affecting everything from air conditioning to the steam used to sterilize instruments used in surgeries.
“I want to make sure you understand this is not hypothetical,” Charmel told the commissioners.
Charmel said there was a large water main break in Ansonia in 2011 which caused the hospital to lose water.
“Water pressure dropped and we lost all domestic water supply,” Charmel said.
“I can tell you, because I was there, there was panic,” he said. “Our hospital was filled with patients. There were procedures going on throughout the hospital. Luckily, water was restored before anyone was harmed, but I can tell you, it was a very scary situation.”
The hospital complained to the Regional Water Authority officials. They pointed out vulnerabilities in Derby’s aging water distribution system and the potential to knock Griffin’s water supply offline.
“Our support (of the application) is because we have to be concerned about patient safety. Water is critical to patient safety,” Charmel said. “We’re concerned the system is beginning to fail.”
A number of Derby elected officials spoke in opposition to the tank’s proposed location, including Mayor Anthony Staffieri and Aldermen Carmen DiCenso, Ron Sill and DeGennaro.
Staffieri said Regional Water needs to consider the site on Silver Hill Road in Ansonia. Staffieri said the company already owns the property, it’s a mile away — and there’s a tank there already.
“It’s safer and it’s not such a crazy job of what they would have to do,” Staffieri said.
Water officials indicated that location was too high for their purposes and required more work, making it less than ideal.
Click the play button below to watch a portion of Staffieri’s remarks.
The opposition to the water tank even crossed city political lines.
“For once, I have to go on record, agreeing with Mayor Staffieri. This is not the place to put it,” Sill said.
The questions from planning and zoning commissioners were as tough as those from neighbors.
Ted Estwan Jr., the commission’s chairman, questioned how the water company planned to deal with Summit Street after it is destroyed by 750 trucks.
Regional Water officials said they would research that question and come up with an answer.
Thibault, the 24-year-old new homeowner, listened to about three hours of speakers before she approached the commission.
Her voice quivered and tears formed in her eyes as she spoke.
“I’m freaking out right now,” she said. “How am I ever going to sell my house? How am I going to raise my family here?”
