Lawyers seeking the approval of a 140-unit residential development off Long Hill Cross Road in Shelton say the city’s Plan for Conservation and Development is outdated and should not be followed.
But several residents and some public officials, including members of the city’s Conservation Commission, the Board of Aldermen and the city’s Water Pollution Control Authority, think otherwise.
That was the gist of the debate May 22 during a public hearing on a zone change that could pave the way for the proposed development, called “Hawks Ridge.”
Developer Albert J. Grasso has proposed a Planned Development District (PDD) to the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission that would include 60 single-family homes, 80 condominium units and an assisted living facility at a 40-acre tract between Long Hill Cross Road, Beard Sawmill Road and the Route 8 expressway.
Currently the land in question is zoned as a “light industrial park,” where factories and offices are allowed, but residential development is not.
It’s been listed that way in the city’s Plan for Conservation and Development — a document that acts as a blueprint for development — for some 50 years.
But attorneys Stephen Bellis and Dominick Thomas suggested the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission allow all remaining undeveloped parcels of land along Shelton’s Bridgeport Avenue corridor to be spot zoned, which they said would assure the city gets the maximum amount of tax revenue from each.
The land is owned by the Wells family, a farm family who lived there for 12 generations. The family has a contract to sell the land to Grasso, subject to zoning approval.
Bellis and Thomas, who handle as many Shelton zoning applications between them as all other lawyers combined, represent Grasso and the Wells family, respectively.
Opposition to the Hawks Ridge proposal, as expressed at an earlier April 26 hearing, focused on urging the PZC to follow the Plan for Conservation and Development — and prohibit the land from being developed for residential use.
Bellis and Thomas countered their opponents at the May 22 hearing by arguing exactly the opposite, because they said no one in Connecticut wants to build a factory or office buildings in the current economy. Instead, there is strong demand for residential development in Shelton, they said.
“You are being asked to plan like it was 50 years ago,” Thomas said.
He claimed that the success of the Bridgeport Avenue corridor was due to PDD developments that deviated from the Plan for Conservation of Development, not by following the Plan.
“Go out and prove me wrong,” Thomas told the commission. “Go out and find an economist or a Realtor who says we’re going to start building LIP like we did 50 years ago.”
Bellis said the Plan for Conservation and Development was only a guide, and he read a statement in it that said it was appropriate to deviate from it if a significant change makes that appropriate. The recession in 2008 constituted that “significant change,” Bellis said.
Opponents weren’t through, however.
Karen Platt, a resident of Long Hill Cross Road, commented that when Bellis represented a factory owner on the street a few years ago, he argued that Long Hill Cross Road did not have a residential character. Now that he is representing a residential developer who wants to build there, he says it does, she said.
Platt said the proposed development will add significantly to the traffic congestion on the road, which is curvy and hilly.
Another resident, Gil Pastore, said he’s not against development on the Hawks Ridge site, but he favors zoning it R‑1, one-acre residential zoning, instead of the much denser development that is proposed.
PZC Chairman Ruth Parkins read letters from Board of Alderman President John Anglace and Alderman Eric McPherson, both urging that the Plan for Conservation and Development be followed.
McPherson said approving the Hawks Ridge application would “open the flood gates” for PDD proposals, and Anglace said it would effectively make the Plan for Conservation and Development “defunct.”
At the end of his remarks, Bellis countered by claiming that Aldermen have no business speaking against zoning applications because the Board of Aldermen has no authority in those matters.
Bellis also announced that Grasso and the owners of Honeycell LLC, a factory at 600 Bridgeport Ave. adjacent to the Hawks Ridge development property, have agreed to a land swap. If the application is approved, Grasso will give Honeycell a one-acre section in return for a one-acre plot at a different location.
The land swap will permit Honeywell to expand by building a warehouse, which will further increase Shelton’s tax base, he said.
But the land swap will also result in the loss of one condominium building containing four units, reducing the total residential units in the proposed development from 140 to 136, Bellis said.
