By Jarret Liotta

WESTPORT — Despite clear warnings to limit development as early as 1956, Westport continues paying the price of unchecked building with far-reaching issues related to flooding.

Ted Gill, engineer with the Department of Public Works, took the Flood & Erosion Control Board to school Wednesday night with an hour-long, detailed history outlining why the town continues to suffer extreme flooding problems.

Undisclosed Proposal

Gill and his department have apparently prepared an extensive proposal aimed at trying to address the issue, but it has not been made available to the public, though members of the appointed board were provided copies.

Gill said First Selectwoman Jennifer Tooker has it in hand and will be discussing it in detail with Peter Ratkiewich, DPW director, at an upcoming meeting between the two.

“We still haven’t officially heard from the first selectwoman that we’re going to have support from the … town,” Gill said, regarding the proposal.

History of Westport’s Response to Flooding

Meanwhile, following extensive research, Gill gave a detailed history on how the town has responded — and not responded — to warnings, plans and proposals related to flooding over the years.

Several large hurricanes, in 1938, 1944 and 1954 — the first of which brought a storm surge up to an elevation of 9.4 feet when it flooded a large portion of Westport’s coast — led to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers conducting coastal studies throughout New England in 1961.

“Their report came up with a bunch of different solutions,” Gill said, to address tidal flooding along the Saugatuck River.

“They basically said there is no cost-effective way to stop tidal flooding along the Saugatuck River,” he noted, but ACE proposed building a dyke around the whole Compo neighborhood and fixing storm drains to mitigate future floods.

“The town pretty much flat out rejected the notion and said there was no interest in having that done,” Gill said, with a similar proposal shot down in the 1980s.

Fluvial Flooding

Separate of tidal flooding, the town experienced an intense example of fluvial flooding in October, 1955, when 10 inches of rain fell — what at that time was identified as a thousand-year storm.

“Two days after that the RTM actually resolved to create the Flood and Erosion Control Board,” Gill said, to try and address flooding.

The FECB immediately commissioned a study by an engineering firm. Along with costly changes to improve waterways, that 1956 study emphasized a need to limit development in town.

“What they found is that it was going to bring a significant cost to improve waterways, but the big thing that needed to be done was an emphasis on limited developing,” Gill said.

“Common sense did not prevail”

At that time, however, with no planning nor zoning rules in place to protect wetlands, nor official limitations on construction, building occurred unfettered, including projects taking place within wetlands.

“There was nothing really stopping them from doing stuff except for common sense, and common sense did not prevail,” Gill said, with some builders and developers even rerouting streams to abet their projects.

Despite warnings about more impervious surfaces leading to more water, no new rules were put in place.

Further, report recommendations that suggested plans to improve waterway flow — including extensive changes to the Saugatuck River and redevelopment of larger streams such as the Willow Brook — were dismissed.

“Needless to say, none of that got done … Nobody thought it was a good idea, so that report was basically scrapped,” Gill said.

701 Study

Another report — the 701 Study — was completed in 1964 and centered on improving channels in streams.

Again, the town was warned about limiting development.

“Development is the key, and the more impervious surfaces we get, the worse flooding is going to get,” Gill noted.

But recommendations to redesign bridges, culverts, channels and more were ultimately not completed because, in part, the report was based on incorrect data that didn’t accurately reflect Westport’s topography.

“So you end up with some errors in the report that they could not really address,” Gill said, and so nothing was done.

A Town Comprehensive Drainage Improvement Plan was embarked upon by a then-new firm called Leonard Jackson Associates in 1974, highlighting suggested improvements to nine major streams, along with cost estimates.

Finally completed in 1981, it was presented by the flood board to the RTM, where the original intention was to see all the work completed by 1987.

It never happened, ironically in part because of burgeoning development in town, which occupied the time of the very agencies responsible for overseeing and implementing the flood work.

Gill outlined further confusion during the 1970s and 1980s in terms of which government bodies — the Planning and Zoning Commission, the Conservation Commission, and the FECB — held or should maintain responsibilities for what.

Neighborhood Opposition

The 1980s also saw a fruitless effort by the town to address flooding at Pussywillow Brook because of fervent opposition from the neighbors in the region of Guyer and Valley Roads, which didn’t believe — owing to several years of drought—that flooding was even an issue in town.

Neighbors also had strong concerns about how dramatic changes to address the flooding would, ironically, result in adverse impacts on the environment — something Gill said remains a challenge.

“We’ve never had a plan come through that kind of found a balance between those two,” he said — reworking waterways without causing substantial damage to the natural area.

“So they decided to postpone any channel improvements … until public acceptance was more pronounced,” Gill said of the flood board, which instead turned its focus to improvements of stream crossing under town roads — in particular along Silver Brook.

Flood board members were largely silent and pensive following Gill’s report.

“You don’t present a very encouraging picture,” Chair William Mazo said.

Gill noted that the good news was there wasn’t a lot on the board’s plate at this time, so it was able to give some attention to the issue.

Asked what was to be done to address one of Westport’s largest concerns, Gill said that would depend on what came of initial discussions between Ratkiewich and Tooker.

“Hopefully we get a solid answer on that within the next week or two,” he said.