By Kerri Williams
WESTPORT – The Hamlet of Saugatuck project is in limbo following a lengthy Planning & Zoning Commission work session about the application on Monday.
Following five hours of deliberation, where everything from traffic and parking to water views was addressed, commission members decided to reconvene in two weeks to determine how they stand on the project proposed by Roan Ventures.
Prior to the meeting, Town Attorney Ira Bloom suggested that members try to reach a consensus on Monday so that a resolution could be drafted by the town’s zoning office. Planners closed the public hearing on the application on June 18, with a formal decision required within 65 days.
Straw poll: 4-3 against
During an informal poll at the beginning of the session, four commissioners said they were leaning towards voting against the application and three said they were in favor. Those in favor were Michael Cammeyer, Neil Cohn, and Breanne Injeski. Opposed to the project were Michael Calise, Paul Lebowitz, Amy Wistreich, and Patrizia Zucaro.
The project, if approved, could be the biggest municipal development ever in Westport, consisting of a multi-use development of 11 buildings, including retail, hotel and residential buildings between the Saugatuck River, Charles Street, Franklin Street and Railroad Place.
The plan complies, but does it fit?
In arguing in favor of the project, Cohn said that town staff have said that it complies with Text Amendment 819, which was drafted in 2022 and led to the current application. “Legally it is our obligation to approve,” he said.
Fellow Commissioner Wistreich rebutted with her two major concerns about the potential development: traffic and the fact that the Architectural Review Board did not approve of the project.
“I am thinking that the traffic is unbearable in Saugatuck and will only get worse,” she said.
Another concern of several commissioners was that the plan feels to them to be an urban development and not one suited to a small town.
“I think it is more of an urban design and so does the Architectural Review Board,” Wistreich said. Chairman Lebowitz and Zucaro said they agreed.
“I still think it’s urban, with a flat roof,” Zucaro said. “I don’t think this style matches our style.”
But Cohn said that the proposal meets the requirements and therefore should be approved. “We’d all like a small, cozy project,” he said, adding that commissioners should have “no magical thinking.”
Compliance questioned, line by line
Commissioner Zucaro went through the text amendment line by line, stating the ways that she questions whether Roan is not complying with the regulation. Lebowitz later thanked her for her “hard work” in looking at the amendment.
Lebowitz said one of his concerns is that the development relies on a parking management plan, or valet parking. “It’s 100 percent parking management driven. That doesn’t exist in Westport,” he said.
For Calise, his biggest concern is that Roan has proposed to change Franklin Street to two lanes and to add a roundabout. “Nowhere in the text amendment does it give the applicant authority to make off-site changes,” he said, adding that the changes are for the “benefit of them and to the detriment of citizens.”
Fix problems with conditions
Other concerns of the commissioners were the lack of parking spaces for employees, insufficient water views, and traffic flow in an already congested area. Several members pointed out that many of these concerns could be addressed through conditions that the developer would need to adhere to.
“Ninety percent (of the concerns) can be conditions,” Cammeyer said. Neil Cohn added: “Let’s serve the town and the law and vote in favor.”
Cammeyer and Injeski, who both came out in favor of the proposal, said the project has more benefits than downsides. “Our professional staff, who lives and breathes this day by day, says it complies,” Cammeyer said.
Is the alternative better?
During the public hearing on the application, Roan officials had said that if the application is denied, they may consider an 8-30g affordable housing complex in Saugatuck in lieu of the Hamlet. Cohn brought this up on Monday, saying that another proposal for the site might be less well received than this one.
But Lebowitz said that commissioners should only focus on the current proposal, not what could come next. “Whatever might come should have no bearing on what is in front of us,” he said.
Reach a consensus on July 21, final decision July 28
The commission will reconvene in two weeks, on July 21, when Lebowitz said members will need to reach a consensus on which way they will vote on the project.
Commissioners asked that Michelle Perillie, director of the department, put together a document of the concerns brought up Monday so that they can review them ahead of the meeting.
A final vote on the project would likely take place at the commission’s July 28 meeting.
Read more Westport Journal coverage of the Hamlet
- Developers plan to pursue 8-30g application if Hamlet is not approved
- Conservation Commission approves Hamlet project, with 23 conditions
- With less than a week before deadline, P&Z Hamlet hearing focuses on traffic, parking issues
- Selectwomen take on Hamlet traffic issues
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.
This is great reporting, thank you for the coverage and concise formulations from all perspectives. The Westport Journal is providing a major service here, from opinion to just the facts. This is an important issue for me, having resided in town for many decades. I have many, many comments, however, there is something about the completeness of the reporting here that has me biting of tongues.
The Saugatuck Village deserves the best in town planning and development that we can give it. The Hamlet is not it. It’s not for Westport. It’s not favored by most Westporters. In fact, opposition has been fierce and passionate.
The Planning and Zoning Commission has done a fantastic job in thoroughly examining The Hamlet application. Even still, there are enough unanswered questions, or unsatisfactory answers, to deny this application.
That there is non compliance in even the slightest manner with the applicant’s own text amendment is reason enough to deny.
Commissioner Wistreich got it right when she said at the top of the meeting that the applicant should have withdrawn and taken the time necessary to cure the many ills with their proposal: size, scope, architecture, traffic and parking, to name just a few. All of us should applaud Commissioner Zucaro for the deep dive on each and every potential non compliance in the regulation (which is faulty in and of itself).
The discretion given the PZC for special permitting can be exercised to the fullest.
The hardline advocacy and badgering by some commissioners is disconcerting. The fact that not a single minute was spent on how this application serves the affordable housing mandate is telling.
Let’s talk conditions. How many conditions are too many? The decision is getting bogged down with condition after condition by the proponents and town attorney to fix the many obvious problems with the proposal. At some point, when is an excessive number of conditions noncompliance? Former PZC Chair Cathy Walsh said long ago the application should never be approved on a conditional basis. She was on to something.
This proposal is a bad version of planning and development for the town of Westport.