Greenwich Homeowners in Conservation Zones

Read Bud Dealys Columns on Greenwich Issues and Real Estate

Published Greenwich Time 1/7/03

WILL P&Z LISTEN TO RTM AND HOMEOWNERS?

Letter to the Editor:

Thank you for the Editorial “Rethinking the town’s FAR regulations” on December 18, 2002, which recommended that the Planning and Zoning Commission reevaluate the use of FAR regulations because “community sentiment supports different tactics”.  We completely agree.  The P&Z will decide on the current FAR proposal at its January 7^th meeting.  We hope that they listen to the sentiments so well expressed in that Editorial. 

However, the comments expressed by the chair of the P&Z in your Greenwich Time article on December 16, 2002 were disheartening at best.  Mrs. Stone is still talking about relying on the public sentiment expressed back in 1998, before our Town’s four year “experiment” with the 1998 FAR and the inequities that it created for homeowners.  She should be listening to the current expression of public sentiment- at the public hearings on FAR and in the RTM resolution (passed at the December meeting by a 2:1 margin).  Numerous homeowners who were proponents of the FAR in 1998 have changed stance in 2002 and also requested that the P&Z reevaluate the issue at the most recent hearings.   People in Town want the P&Z to step back and think of new solutions rather than passing the same old FAR, which has not been demonstrated to solve the problem.  Mrs. Stone in that article states the intention of the P&Z to pass the FAR because it was overturned by a court, not because it is solving any problem.  Instead she goes on to indicate her true intent to add to the FAR other restrictions that she thinks may address the problem.  This type of shotgun experimental approach is the antithesis of “planning”, which should target specific goals and provide a rational basis for zoning regulations.  Mrs. Stone states that the RTM resolution asks P&Z to do its job and that they want to do their job.  If that is the case, then why are they experimenting with our community, creating nonconformity, and devaluing a large segment of properties in the process, in violation of their statutory responsibilities? 

The RTM resolution went further than just asking the P&Z to define the problem.  It asked for development of an equitable solution that protects the property values of all homeowners.  The current proposal meets neither of these requests.  P&Z should withdraw the currently pending proposal.  Promises to reexamine the problem or study the issue after passing this proposal are not good enough.  We remember how P&Z promised to address conservation zoned and undersized lots after passing FAR in 1998, yet for four years they flatly refused to pass any relief and turned down six different proposals presented by homeowners.  Promises are not good enough.  P&Z should not act on the current proposal and come up with new, EQUITABLE regulations that address the problem and meet the current needs of the homeowners in Town as expressed by the RTM last month. 

Rebecca Balikci, Member RTM District 11, Land Use Committee

Robert Lardon, Member RTM District 11, Budget Overview Committee