Butow emphasizes economic development will be his campaign theme

By Scott Benjamin

BROOKFIELD – Mel Butow says Long Island is “very different” than Brookfield in that it is so close to Manhattan that “you’ve got to get it done now because it might rain in the next hour.”

Even though Brookfield also is an easy commute from Fifth Avenue, northern Fairfield County doesn’t move at the speed of a subway.

“It’s more laid back and I like the small-town feeling” in Brookfield, said Butow, a financial officer who moved from North Woodmere on Long Island to town about five and a half years ago and will likely be nominated July 16 at the Republican caucus for first selectman.

He noted, “The proximity to neighbors was closer” in Long Island.

Besides, everyone on Long Island is either a Mets or Yankees fan. In Brookfield there are Red Sox fans arguing with Yankee fans over whether Alex Cora or Aaron Boone will be the first during the London series to grab the bearskin hat from a Queen’s Guard and wear it while touring Buckingham Palace.

Butow moved because he has daughters, sons-in-laws and grandchildren living in Wilton and in Scarsdale, N.Y. He had been considering downsizing his home and then after it was damaged during Superstorm Sandy in October 2012 his family made the move to Brookfield.

He’s become active in municipal government by serving on the Economic Development Commission, the local Republican Town Committee and as an alternate on the Planning Commission.

During the 1960s Brookfield grew more per capita than any of the 169 municipalities in Connecticut. Since then, the southern portion of Federal Road has become a booming commercial area with big box stores and an array of furniture outlets.

Now, Brookfield appears to be on the threshold of a new era that was initially conceived by the late Ken Keller, a Democrat who was first selectman from 1983 to 1987 and later chaired the municipal Economic Development Commission.

Keller noted in the late 1980s that Brookfield lacked a New England-style central business district.

Municipal officials have sought since then to turn the 198-acre Brookfield Town Center near the Four Corners intersection on Federal Road into that kind of enterprise.

That became a reality in November 2009 with the opening of the $105 million Route 7 bypass, which sharply reduced the flow of traffic at the Four Corners from an estimated 30,000 vehicle trips each weekday

“I would love to see it like downtown Ridgefield,” Butow said of the Brookfield Town Center.

The Brookfield Village buildings that have opened feature small businesses with apartments above them. The vision has been to have the housing to help generate more money for the business tenants and provide a customer base.

Municipal officials through the years have said many of the customers in Brookfield Town Center would come from within a one-mile radius.

Butow said he is disappointed with the progress in developing the Brookfield Town Center.

“Still, nothing has really happened,” he said in an interview. “It has been stalled. There has been a saturation of housing” and little business development.

First Selectman Steve Dunn, who is expected to be nominated for a third term in July by the Democratic caucus, said in a phone interview that a developer has made inquiries about building a supermarket near the Still River Greenway in the Brookfield Town Center and would provide 60 public parking spaces, which could be used by residents using the greenway.

He said Starbucks also is interested in opening an outlet in the central business district.

In response to Butow’s concerns about the demolition of the former sites of Mother Earth and Subway, Dunn said the selectmen had set a 60-day agreement with the developer in April that has now has been exceeded and the town is following up to get those structures taken down.

The first selectman said the second section of the streetscape through the Four Corners began in early June and will be completed later this summer.

Butow said he is pleased with the decision by Branson Ultrasonics to move its operations from Danbury and build a 140,000-square-foot structure on the Brookfield tract in the Berkshire Corporate Park (BCP). He said as first selectman he would encourage further development on the 75-acre Brookfield tract at BCP.

He said he also is enthusiastic about the construction of a medical building on the former cornfield along Junction Road. The application by Costco 11 years ago for the corn field received mixed reviews, as some residents objected to increased traffic near churches and pre-school facilities. Costco withdrew its application and instead expanded its operations on Federal Road.

Dunn said that the selectmen are currently studying the town’s building permit fees and now they compare to other municipalities. Butow said he doesn’t believe that they should be increased, since that might stifle development in Brookfield.

Dunn said that during his four years in office, Brookfield has become more attractive to developers since the zoning regulations have been rewritten.

He said that Branson Ultrasonics had approval less than three months after submitting its application.

“Under the old system it would have taken nine to 12 months to get that permit,” Dunn said.

Butow said he also agrees with the selectmen’s decision to seek an extension of the current moratorium on affordable housing, which is set to expire in 2021 and would be extended to 2025. Under that agreement with the state, affordable housing would be restricted to Federal Road.

Dunn has said there have been concerns that placing affordable housing in residential neighborhoods would reduce home values.

Brookfield Patch reported in 2015 that Dunn said a survey completed by his campaign indicated that the development of the Brookfield Town Center and education were the top two issues among voters.

State Rep. Stephen Harding (R-107) of Brookfield said in a phone interview that based on feedback from constituents he believes those are still the two prime issues in town.

Butow said he was opposed to the $78.1 million Huckleberry Hill Elementary School (HHES) project before it was approved at referendum in March because of concerns that there would be cost overruns. Voters had to approve additional appropriations for the Whisconier Middle School addition that was initially approved in 1998 and the Brookfield High School renovation that was ratified in 2003.

He said that all along he has supported the concept of building a new school that would educate students from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade and then utilize Center Elementary School for other purposes.

Butow said he is still concerned about cost overruns because of the expenses that might be incurred from installing green technologies to make the new HHES more energy efficient.

Dunn said the project is still in the early architectural stages and it has not been determined how many green technologies will be included. He said he is committed to keeping the project within the $78.1 million price-tag.

The first selectman added that the state Department of Administrative Services (DAS) labeled the town’s application for a 22.5 percent grant for the project – which would bring the local costs down to $63.3 million – as “exemplary.” He and Harding have each said they expect the DAS to formally approve the project in December and forward it to the state Bond Commission.

Butow, who is semi-retired, has more than 40 years of financial management experience and has been the chief executive officer of a small business.

“I’m a person who analyzes everything,” he said. “I will drill down as far as I can go.”

“I think that his understanding of budget numbers would be helpful if he is elected as first selectman,” said Harding.

The state representative added, “I think there will be a positive discussion during the campaign. You have two very good candidates.”

Dunn retired six years ago as a vice president at J.P. Morgan Chase.

Butow said he believes the state will continue to curtail assistance to Brookfield, as has been the case in recent years under Gov. Ned Lamont (D-Greenwich) and former Gov. Dannel Malloy (D-Essex). He said he would attempt to reduce expenses before increasing taxes to make up the shortfalls.

He also said that as first selectman he would continue the practice of adding more money each year for road repairs into the operating budget instead of in bond appropriations so that they town could have fewer interest expenses.

Between 1987 and 2005, the Republican nominee for first selectman was victorious in 10 successive elections.

Since then, the party has won only one election for first selectman – in 2013 when Bill Tinsley prevailed by just 81 votes.

Dunn has captured roughly two-third of the vote in each of the last two municipal elections even though 2018 figures from the Secretary of the State’s office indicate that there are 4,003 Republicans in Brookfield and just 2,921 Democrats. The largest block are the 5,117 unaffiliated voters. There also are 260 voters registered with minor parties.

Dunn told Brookfield Patch in June 2015 that given the demographics of Brookfield it was “an uphill climb” for a Democrat to be elected first selectman even though Bill Davidson, a former Republican who became an unaffiliated voter, won as the Democratic nominee in 2009 and 2011.

Dunn said at the time that he felt there were enough persuadable voters for him to get elected as he embarked on a tour in which he visited 1,400 residences in Brookfield.

His lawn signs stated, “Save Our Schools” and “Restore Integrity.”

The latter message was an apparent reference to Tinsley’s plea of no contest to a misdemeanor petit larceny charge from April 2012 regarding receipts that were reportedly taken from a Vermont liquor store where he worked part time.

The News-Times of Danbury has reported that Tinsley said his plea of no contest was made as a “financial decision” that the charge was “frivolous.”

Brookfield Patch reported shortly after the 2015 election that Dunn had estimated that “500 to 600” Republicans had voted for him.

Fifteen years ago, Republican Town Committee members joked that a Democratic nominating caucus had smaller attendance then a monthly GOP town committee meeting.

Over the recent election cycles, Dunn has said he has never seen so many Democrats working at phone banks to get the party’s candidates elected.

However, despite an aggressive challenge from Brookfield Democrat Daniel Pearson last fall, Harding, aided by a band of Brookfield Republican volunteers, tallied more than 59 percent of the votes to capture a third term in a district that includes all of Brookfield, as well as the Stony Hill section of Bethel and a slice of northern Danbury.

Are there enough persuadable voters for the Republicans to recapture the first selectman’s office this year?

“I think that can happen if we get out our platform to enough people,” said Butow, who said he would probably campaign door to door.

Sacred Heart Political Science professor Gary Rose has said that the poor results for Republicans in Connecticut during the 2018 gubernatorial and state legislative elections were largely due to a negative reaction to Republican President Donald Trump’s policies.

Harding said that won’t be a factor this fall.

“I think that municipal elections are largely determined by local issues and knowing the candidates that you are voting for instead of anything related to the federal issues,” he said.

Butow said one of his principal messages will be attracting more millennials and keeping the ones already living in Brookfield in town.

The Boston Globe reported in December 2016 that Connecticut, a largely suburban state, has had difficulty attracting millennials since many of the better-paying jobs are in the major cities that have innovation hubs, such as the Route 128 corridor near Boston.

However, MSN.com recently reported that per capita, the New Haven-Milford metro area ranks second nationally in attracting new millennials and the Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk region is rated 29^th. In particular, Stamford, which has several large companies ranging from NBC Sports to Indeed to Henkel has developed a significant population of millennials over the recent years.

Butow said he believes Brookfield also can entice more young professionals.

He said, “They come when they see more business.”

Which means there could be a younger generation of Red Sox and Yankee fans in town that can argue about who is better: Mookie Betts or Aaron Judge?