Only in Easton!

After witnessing last night's scientifically rigorous and highly professional conservation commission/ inland's wetlands agency meeting, chaired by our long-time Wetlands Chair Dori Wollen, I feel it is “apropos” to provide an urgent update to our residents regarding the Plum Tree Lane 60-apartment and 9-townhouse project, proposed by developer and fellow Easton resident, Steve Shapiro.

This public hearing will certainly be the “talk of the town” and will also go down in Easton's history for many reasons, as I respectfully summarize below.

The breaking news is that last night, the proposal was changed to propose a 29-townhouse alternate development. Thus, this new proposal will go through the normal wetlands review process, and the next public hearing will be in February (date TBD).

Additionally, I wholeheartedly agree with my good colleague selectman Nick D'Addario, that elections have consequences. What we witnessed last night at the conservation commission/ inland wetlands agency third public hearing was clear evidence that having effective leadership in the First Selectman's office leads directly to important issues being skillfully handled in the best manner possible. I encourage all residents to WATCH THE RECORDING to see and hear all of the details for yourselves. I give highlights and a written summary below as well for now.
Specifically, based on my own wetlands lawsuits and wetlands intervenor experience, my own Easton conservation commission service, and other lawsuits that I have filed against the town and others, I personally already knew for many years that attorney Keith Ainsworth is regarded as one of the top wetlands litigators in Connecticut.

Thus, once I took office, I set out to hire Keith, and I was also transparently and frankly scrutinized the past wetlands performance of our previous attorneys and the previous administration’s total reliance on them for all town matters in general, including their plan to continue using them for this -- very wetlands-specific -- Plum Tree Lane apartment building project.

Last night in stark contrast to past meetings, we saw indeed -- how skilled wetlands litigator, Keith Ainsworth, is in supporting the conservation commission/wetlands agency to properly prepare for -- and most importantly treat the wetlands applicants fairly -- by rigorously meeting the statutory requirements according to all of the proper procedures to ensure that wetlands considerations are properly handled according to the wetlands laws and without any deficiencies in the proper process.

Simply put, in Easton under my administration going forward, we will comply rigorously with all applicable laws -- and we will endeavor to stop the pattern that we have seen over the last few years of not demanding the absolute best and most successful lawyer be chosen for each unique legal specialty. Furthermore, junior attorneys who are recent law school grads will no longer be used for our matters.

To use an analogy, if you need a critical heart surgery -- you do the research, and you ask your doctor friends who is the best heart surgeon -- and whom they would use themselves, and whom they trust to operate on their own heart. Similarly, if you need legal help, you ask another lawyer whom they would use for themselves.

Also, and this is absolutely critical, you never hire the law firm per se, rather you hire the actual individual attorney(s) who will be doing the actual legal work at the law firm-- so hiring a top name law firm is of absolutely no use -- if the actual attorney(s) who handles your case at the firm is not the absolute best attorney possible to use at the law firm.

Thus, in stark contrast to past practices, we will now hire the best specialist attorney for whatever legal issue arises. So if we have a labor law issue, we will hire the best labor lawyer and so on.

Another clear example is that I hired Steve Stafstrom from Pullman & Comley, the Redding Town Attorney, and Bridgeport Democrat state representative, to handle our local zoning enforcement issues, and I hired Ken Slater and Rich Roberts at Halloran and Sage in Hartford to handle the Saddle Ridge Hartford land use docket cases. Steve is also working on the indoor riding arena zoning and building violations next to the Easton Village store with our new planning and zoning chair, Ray Ganim, who is also an experienced local attorney. For example, the certificate of occupancy (the “CO”) has been revoked five times for the indoor riding ring due to the lawsuits and state building department actions filed by the aggrieved neighbor, Steve Montgomery.

I want this pattern of residents having to constantly sue the town to enforce zoning regulations and their property rights -- to come to an end summarily. Residents should not have to sue the town to enforce our zoning and other land use regulations. The legal expense alone creates an undue burden on residents, as I have experienced myself personally when I spent nearly 80k defending my property rights. This resident-unfriendly attitude of “only listening when there is a lawsuit” must end.

Therefore, having a lawyer as a First Selectman and having other lawyers as volunteers and advisers is a good thing, and I always refer back to environmentalist Selectman Bill Kupinse, who was an attorney and understood and represented the town's interests very well.

Not to belabor the obvious, but what we saw last night was basically akin to the O.J. Simpson trial where a "dream team" was assembled to properly handle this wetlands matter fairly and to provide the necessary expert testimony and information to the conservation commission/ wetlands agency members so that they can fairly and rigorously process this matter, according to all of the applicable laws.

Specifically, under Keith's legal direction, the conservation commission received expert testimony from the premier experts in Connecticut, including herpetologist and author Dr. Michael Klemens, who is universally regarded as Connecticut's best herpetologist. His discussion of the protected wood turtle habitat on this property was rigorous and detailed.

The public comments of non-expert layman such as myself are not nearly as relevant to these wetlands proceedings, but any member of the public is of course entitled to speak at a wetlands “public hearing” so in this way it was at very least engaging for a long time resident Dwight Senior to bring two live turtles who are a close South American relative of the endangered wetlands wood turtles to the meeting. The crowd obviously was quite patient and respectful during this long meeting, so it was a nice “break” to see live relatives of the endangered wood turtle walking around the presentation table. Certainly, this meeting, due to Dwight’s presentation, will always stand out vividly in Easton’s history.

However, the truly important thing is that the requisite experts were present -- and testified properly in person -- to give the applicant a fair and rigorous wetlands review process.

In addition, a top storm water civil engineer and forestry expert, Steve Trinkhaus PE, was also used and testified extensively in person. In-person testimony by experts, which is subject to cross-examination by the applicant’s attorney, as occurred last night, is the best way to present evidence into the record, according to the courts. You may recall that under our previous attorneys, we only had one main expert, Tom Ryder, an ecologist, testify in person from Landtech. Thus, Steve Trinkhaus was hired by the conservation commission/wetland agency as a peer reviewer, and Steve proficiently introduced his stormwater and forestry, and other points himself. 320 trees are proposed to be cut down, for example.

Just let me be perfectly clear (and even blunt) that if the previous law firm had remained as the law firm on this case using an attorney who is located in Tennessee and who could not attend the hearings in person, had scheduling conflicts with other meetings, and if we only had one expert testify in person, we simply would simply not have the same level of wetlands specific legal preparation or even a “live attorney at the meeting” that we witnessed last night. That is just the plain, unvarnished truth.

In addition, under Keith’s and Dori’s direction, the experts at LandTech sent all three well-known peer review experts to testify in person, including soil scientist and senior ecologist Anthony Zemba, a civil stormwater engineer, Robert Pryor, and ecologist Tom Ryder (sent again). These are all well-known experts who testified in person about all of the relevant wetlands issues.

Additionally, the Southwest Conservation District Municipal Support arm, staffed by former CT DEEP officials and scientists like Chris Sullvan submitted a detailed report and sent their experts and testified via Zoom regarding the protected wood turtles, the brook trout, the wetlands hydrology, storm water pollution, and other wetlands issues.

Additionally, our fire marshal, Schuyler Sherwood, testified regarding fire truck turning space issues and how paved surface plans and areas can affect the wetlands, and he also introduced a letter from the Trumbull fire department regarding the same issues.

The chair of the Aspetuck Land Trust, David Brant, also gave an extensive testimony, including the importance of the “cold water fishery” for the Mill River trout area and how ALT’s Bill Kupinse conservation park is across the river and near this proposed development.

Many other details were discussed -- too many to summarize here, so please read the expert reports online.

Many other neighbors spoke as well, but the critical importance is that actual scientific experts testified in person to properly process a wetlands matter like this.

Lastly, one of the experts made the observation that in his 40 years, he had never seen a town -- especially a small town -- be so well prepared for a wetlands public hearing, and that quote: "the best wetlands lawyer, Keith Ainsworth, and all of the best experts possible were there.”

Again, this is Easton’s “dream team.”

So elections do indeed have consequences. And again, one of the biggest consequences is that we have greatly improved the town’s legal representation on land use and wetlands issues. This was a campaign promise.

The documents and expert reports are available online here:
https://www.eastonct.gov/conservation-commissioninland-wetlands-agency/pages/15-plumtree-lane-llc-letters-documents-reports. I encourage everyone to read the many details.

Best regards,
Dan Lent
First Selectman