By Kerri Willliams

WESTPORT – In Wednesday’s subcommittee meeting, several members of the public asked the Planning & Zoning Commission to change the General Business District/Saugatuck Marina zone, originally created for the Hamlet project, sooner rather than later.

More than forty viewers attended the meeting of P&Z’s Zoning Regulation Revision subcommittee, which got testy at times.

“The text amendment just needs to go away,” said Jennifer Johnson, one of several members of the public to speak out about the controversial GBD/SM zone. “I urge the commission to just get rid of what’s on the books.”

For their part, P&Z commissioners, who have been working on a change since May, also agreed on changing the area to the General Business District/Saugatuck Zone, like the nearby Gault properties. The matter will come back to the full commission at its next meeting, July 27, but it cannot be voted on until August, according to Michelle Perillie, P&Z director.

The discussion got testy between P&Z Chairman Paul Lebowitz and Commissioner Michael Calise, who, along with fellow Commissioner Patrizia Zucaro, wrote an op-ed piece saying that the zoning decision has been stalled.

Calise referred to a “failure in leadership” that he saw when the commission did not vote on a zone change during its July 13 meeting. At that meeting, Calise had put forth a plan to change the GBD/SM zone to its original designation of General Business District.

Lebowitz defended the text change going back to subcommittee, saying he would not put forth a vote on a “major text change” when just four out of seven commissioners were present at the end of the meeting on July 13. 

However, the video for that meeting shows all six commissioners voting to bring the matter to subcommittee. The vote was 5-1, with Patrizia Zucaro the only “no.” There are currently six full members of the commission, as commissioner John Bolton recently stepped down.

Lebowitz stated that his other problem with taking the vote on July 13 was that members were disagreeing on which zone designation to use. While Calise had recommended GBD, Lebowitz said it was a bad fit for the area along the Saugatuck River since the zone rewards large swaths of parking for commercial building, among other provisions. 

“The GBD insists on a lot of parking,” Lebowitz said, while the Gault zoning calls for parking underneath. “I will not let you ramrod GBD down our throats without more discussion,” he added.

Later, Calise said that he would support a zone change to the GBD/S, along with Zucaro and other commissioners.

Members of the public were not as concerned about the zoning designation as they were that it be changed from the current one, which precipitated the controversial Hamlet application. The P&Z denied the application after some in the community expressed concerns about scale, parking, traffic and the character of the proposed development.

“My understanding is that either zone would work as a temporary stop gap measure,” said Toni Simonetti during public comment, adding that the “crazy Hamlet zone” needs to be replaced. “The point is to do it now,” she said.

Currently, the Planning & Zoning Commission has been hearing a pre-application for a residential development by Spinnaker Real Estate Partners at 606 Riverside Ave., a portion of the area where the Hamlet proposal was located.  According to P&Z director Perillie, Spinnaker plans to come forward with yet another zoning subdistrict proposal for its development.

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Kerri Williams

Kerri Williams is an award-winning writer and journalist. She has worked as a reporter at the Norwalk Hour, as Living editor at the Darien News-Review, and managing editor for the Norwalk Citizen-News. For Westport Journal, she is a reporter as well as a gardening columnist, writing “Cultivating with Kerri.” She recently published her first children’s book – “Mabel’s Big Move,” based on her daughter with special needs.