“Get Your Act Together on This”: After Turbulent Discussion on Proposed Ambler Farm Lease, BOS Will Take Closer Look

Following a somewhat turbulent Board of Selectmen meeting on Tuesday night, May 20, where members initially thought they would take a vote, they’ve decided to re-examine and potentially rewrite the proposed lease between the Town of Wilton and Friends of Ambler Farm.

The decision came despite strong objections from First Selectman Toni Boucher, after three of the other BOS members jointly insisted that more time be taken to get it right.

A Rocky Start

The BOS had first scheduled a discussion and possible vote on the lease at its previous meeting on May 5. During that evening’s public comment, former First Selectman Paul Hannah raised an issue asserting that the Town Charter demanded this particular lease be voted on not just the BOS but by residents in a Special Town Meeting.

Town attorney Doug LoMonte told the BOS a Special Town Meeting wasn’t necessary, according to his interpretation of the Town Charter. But at least two BOS members, Joshua Cole and Kim Healy, were still reticent, ultimately opting to postpone the scheduled vote to the May 20 meeting in order to at least allow additional public comment on the lease.

Even before discussion could begin on Tuesday night, a resident threw a wrench into the matter. Michael Powers — an attorney who once before unsuccessfully sued the Town and Wilton officials in the middle of a thwarted 2019 bid for first selectman — announced during public comment that he had filed for an injunction against a possible BOS vote on the lease — and that a judge had granted the injunction. [Editor’s note: the judge has scheduled a show-cause hearing for June 9 on the matter.]

Although Boucher nonchalantly thanked Powers for his public comment without responding, she did later begin the scheduled lease discussion with a proposed change of course. She suggested that after receiving so much public input and comment on the issue since the May 5 meeting, the BOS should bring the lease to a vote by Special Town Meeting on June 24 — something she had been opposed to until now.

She then invited a “thorough discussion” and asked LoMonte to join at the board table, “so that we can address first a number of the questions posed, again, get some valid legal responses to this, and then open up the floor to every member of this board to ask as many questions as you want.”

The discussion was eagerly anticipated by the BOS members, who had been moved by a singular unanimous opinion issued by the Board of Finance that the lease potentially put the town at financial and legal risk.

While proponents of the lease argue that this arrangement is how things have always been conducted between the town and FOAF — an independent nonprofit that serves as steward to the property — BOF members said simply entering an agreement ‘on good faith’ with a lease potentially extending decades into the future was impractical and potentially costly for the town.

“As written, the lease would commit to open-ended liabilities for generations,” Raimondi said. “We owe it to our taxpayers and to the volunteers and the staff that bring Ambler to life, to ensure that the foundation is sound, the commitments are fair, and the process reflects our shared values of transparency and good government.”

“This is Horrifying”

The BOS members began discussing the first of the 17 points submitted by the BOF with no conclusion or agreement in sight after almost a quarter-hour. Nabulsi asked to make a bigger point.

“If we have to go through all these 17 points, we’ve got… “

Boucher interrupted Nabulsi. “Well, we’re going to do it very briefly.”

“I doubt that,” Nabulsi responded.

Boucher continued. “Then we can have a more thorough discussion on the points you really want to take up. That’s why, if we get bogged down on the first item, if we could just … we’re going to move through a number of them and then come back to that and have a thorough discussion.”

Healy said that wasn’t possible. “We cannot do this tonight,” she said, “This is the conversation we should have had multiple times over the weeks prior to this,” she said.

“I think June 24 [for a Town meeting] is totally unfeasible,” Nabulsi said in agreement, noting that the 17 points raised by the BOF needed to be gone over in detail and, most likely a revised lease drafted and approved by FOAF.

Boucher made it clear that she wanted to see the lease approved as soon as possible, defending its content.

She made several statements to her board, that revisiting the lease was going to cost the town more money in legal fees, and that FOAF was frustrated and might potentially walk away from the table with regard to negotiations if there were further delay or certain changes.

“I have to say, a number of these 17 items are no-starters and cannot move forward at all, otherwise we will not have a lease,” Boucher said. “Some of them are valid and important to discuss, I agree, but not all 17 points.”

As an example Boucher cited a recommendation from the BOF that the lease give the town “the right to terminate the agreement at any time if doing so is in the Town’s best interest.” She said this could, in essence, end negotiations with the FOAF

“They could decide they don’t want to do this anymore,” Boucher said. “I’ve heard that mentioned a couple of times.”

“You’re also not recognizing, and ignoring, the other eight to 10 feedbacks we got from the general public,” Boucher said, referring to several emails put into the record last week in support of the lease.

Selectman Ross Tartell stood with Boucher on wanting to move the lease through quickly, while attorney LoMonte defended the lease and indicated that the town has been working since 2017 to create a lease with Ambler Farm.

“We have to get agreement that they would like to move forward with the lease, first and foremost,” Boucher said, stating several times that it was her job as first selectman to broker the deal and to do so on her own.

“It’s the responsibility of your first selectman to start negotiations … but at the onset that’s done in executive session … because there’s a lot of back and forth that needs to go on between these organizations,” she said.

Editor’s note: GOOD Morning Wilton believes Boucher is using the term “executive session” incorrectly in calling private meetings between her as the only member of the BOS (possibly accompanied by town counsel) and parties with whom she negotiates on behalf of the Town and the BOS. Executive sessions are held out of the public eye by a single board when appropriate as defined by the Freedom of Information Act for very specific reasons. For more on this, and GMW‘s efforts to have more of this discussion open to public observation, see our other story published today.

The other three BOS members pushed back, however, noting that their input and involvement in the process and potential vote had only been going on for a couple of months.

“This has been going on for a long time, but we as a board have had this since the end of March … This is our first real opportunity over these last several weeks to kind of really dig into it and get feedback from the public,” Cole said.

“I want to take a little bit of time and just kind of work through these issues collaboratively,” he added.

Nabulsi acknowledged the mess that had been created.

“It’s very unfortunate how we ended up in this spot,” Nabulsi said, expressing sympathy to FOAF. “This is not where any of us wanted to be, where the Friends have negotiated with the Town in good faith, and now at the 11th hour at best, there’s 17 new points that need to be put on the table and addressed. This is horrifying.”

“But here we are and we’ve gotten here publicly, so people on the Friends saw how we got here,” Nabulsi added.

He suggested that as a board, they meet again to develop a “term sheet” from a starting point of the 17 issues outlined by the BOF.

“And it needs to be our final set of terms that need to be negotiated with the Friends and see if we can reach a resolution on those new, seemingly new 17 points. And to the extent the Friends say no, then we need to come back together and decide if that means it’s a no go for the town,” Nabulsi said.

He joined Cole and Healy on insisting that the BOF be represented when they held that discussion on the matter.

“There’s a lot of very smart, talented people in this town. We owe it to ourselves to look at the feedback that we’ve received from the Board of Finance… that’s received unanimous support from both sides of the aisle,” Cole said. “I take their comments very seriously (and) some of these are big issues,”

Boucher was insistent about continuing the discussion in executive session, despite disagreement from Cole, Healy and Nabulsi. She also balked at their suggestion to include strong BOF representation.

“It is the responsibility of this board. I would suggest that we keep it in house, with our attorneys and with Ambler Farm. We don’t need to make this more complex than it already is,” Boucher said, adding that the BOF had given its input in memo form. “Once we reach — if we do reach — an agreement, we can send it back out to get responses before we take any action.”

Healy responded quickly. “I’d like the Board of Finance there. I’m just saying it. I think it’s important. I think they have provided us with the exact documentation that we needed to go back to the table.”

Boucher ultimately consented to allow BOF Chair Matt Raimondi attend to represent his board’s concerns.

Get Your Act Together

At the end of the meeting, when additional public comment was welcomed, Planning and Zoning Commission Chair Rick Tomasetti — Speaking as a private citizen — lambasted the BOS for their handling of the Ambler Farm lease, as well as Boucher’s reticence to hold regular public updates on the progress of the police station construction.

“I think it’s outrageous,” he said, that they were not discussing it at each BOS meeting, if not putting out weekly updates.

Regarding Ambler Farm, he told the BOS, “You’ve gotta get your act together on this.”

“You’ve taken an asset in our community that everybody really likes and it’s now something that seems contentious and it shouldn’t be … It should have never gotten to this point,” Tomasetti said.

GOOD Morning Wilton firmly believes this Board of Selectmen conversation about the new lease terms should be held in open sessions that the public should be able to witness to remain informed — and we’re urging town officials that publicly. Read our story today about our communication with the Board of Selectmen on it.