The Monday, May 12 meeting of the Planning and Zoning Commission was earmarked as the second and likely final opportunity for public comment on the 118 Old Ridgefield Rd. proposal, but a last-minute change left another potentially-controversial project at center stage.
Yet Another Delay for 118 Old Ridgefield Rd.
For the second meeting in a row, the applicant behind 118 Old Ridgefield—a 20-unit mixed-use residential complex in Wilton Center along the Norwalk River—requested to delay the next public hearing on the project. These back-to-back decisions came after unusually active public comments during the April 14 meeting, in which 14 members of the public testified in person and more than 50 sent their thoughts (both pro and con) via email.
Explaining the continuation, Chair Rick Tomasetti said that the applicant was not able to gather and share updated materials in time for the deadline to be heard this week. The project will be back on the agenda for the Commission’s next meeting on Tuesday, May 27 and the public comment period remains open, meaning there should be opportunity for further testimony.
A New Proposal for the Languishing School Sisters of Notre Dame Property — But There’s a Catch
With 118 Old Ridgefield Rd. off the table for the night, all of the attention was on the next big item: a pre-application hearing for a new, expanded senior care residential center at 345 Belden Hill Rd. The proposal envisions demolishing all current improvements on the property other than the chapel, which would be incorporated into a new, larger facility that would offer a wide range of senior living accommodations.
Attorney for the applicant Lisa Feinberg described the current capacity on site as “collectively, based on record architectural drawings, the structures on the site today once accommodated 325 beds.” As of 2018, a press release by SSND covered in GOOD Morning Wilton listed the capacity as 200 residential units and a 40-bed nursing facility. The final residential population when the facility closed in 2021 was 58 nuns.
The new proposal would feature 280 units in the following breakdown:
- 36 Independent Living Cottages
- 172 Independent Living Apartments
- 48 Assisted Living Apartments
- 24 Memory Care Studios
The applicant has proposed 242 parking spaces for the facility, which would be used by staff, residents and visitors. Memory care patients are not permitted to drive and all residents would be encouraged to use the facility’s shuttles for trips to the grocery store and other nearby destinations.
A pre-application is a voluntary hearing between P&Z and an applicant considering submitting an application. The Commission’s feedback is non-binding but serves as an opportunity for applicants to fine tune projects ahead of the formal public review process. No public comment is permitted. In recent years, pre-applications at P&Z have ballooned in scope, often stretching across multiple years and as many as five or six hearings and rounds of design. In these cases, once a project finally reaches the public review period and comments from the public are permitted, the Commission has effectively given its tacit approval for the application in these pre-app discussions.
In an unusual move, P&Z town staff posted public letters received about the pre-application documents in the Commission’s online files. In his comments, Commissioner Chris Pagliaro took issue with this decision.
“We already have comments from the public on the website, which makes no sense to me because this is not a formal application,” he said. “No disrespect to the public weighing in on things but I don’t know why that’s up there or why that’s a topic at this stage of the conversation.”
The letters were still posted online as of Tuesday morning. One letter is from John Misciosia, President of the Wilton Volunteer Ambulance Corps, stating that an additional 280 senior living units “could significantly affect our ambulance call volume.” He noted that calls from the existing four senior living centers in Wilton make up half of the emergency calls to WVAC and that the group has recently had to pursue adding an additional ambulance to their fleet to keep up with call volume. WVAC receives approximately $100,000 a year from Town sources, equivalent to just 10% of the group’s operating budget.
A second letter came from two neighbors, David and Beth Cristini, who expressed support for the project and praised developer Hines Acquisitions for its engagement with the community so far.
Regarding the need for emergency services, Vice Chair Melissa-Jean Rotini asked whether the applicant considered offering a private ambulance service for residents. Cheryl Mestre of SGR Senior Living explained that they have nurses on site during the day so 911 calls are treated as “a last resort.”
Other comments on the design and concept of the project included questions from Tomasetti about whether the current stone building on the site could be incorporated rather than demolished, and concerns from several commissioners about the increased traffic to and from the property. Pagliaro was the most outspoken on this topic, calling the intersection as-is “brutal” and pointing out that mitigation efforts like shuttle use by residents can’t be enforced by the town.
“A four-way stop sign is not conducive to the traffic at that intersection,” he said. “Unless there is an active solution to that intersection, I am not in favor of this project.”
But despite efforts by Tomasetti to direct attention back to the merits of the project itself, the biggest topic of the evening was a discussion about a hazily-defined but potentially-consequential deed restriction on the property. At the outset of the hearing, Tomasetti and Director of Land Use/Town Planner Michael Wrinn explained that Wilton’s town counsel was reviewing the current deed restriction at the request the Water Pollution Control Authority and would advise the Commission on the nature of its legal weight.
In 2012 and 2013, SSND engaged in discussion with the Town of Wilton about a deal to allow the site to hook up to the town sewer at Miller-Driscoll School, just down Wolfpit Rd. from the convent. The agreement was reached in 2013, alongside a deed restriction stating among other commitments that for the next 50 years, the site could not be expanded by more than 10% of existing gross floor area and that it could only be used in a manner allowed by Wilton’s R2A zoning. Commissioner Ken Hoffman read aloud from the deed restriction itself in his comments.
“You’re raising the square footage from 200,000 to 380,000,” he pointed out.
Furthermore, the R2A zone in Wilton allows for senior care facilities but not ones offering the range of living accommodations currently envisioned by this plan. A special permit or text amendment would be required to allow the proposal.
At that point, attorney Feinberg and Commissioner Eric Fanwick — who, along with Tomasetti, served on WPCA at the time of the agreement — had a back and forth about the nature of the deed restriction.
“This was a restriction put on the property by the current land owners, the School Sisters, and it is my understanding that they are fully prepared to release that restriction. So it would no longer exist,” Feinberg said, noting that the question at WPCA simply relates to the agreement regarding the sewer extension at the time. “But no one else is a party to the [deed] restriction except the Sisters.”
Fanwick then injected. “Are you suggesting that the Sisters represented that they would deed restrict the land for 50 years in order to get access to our sewers — saving them millions of dollars to build their own private sewer — and that on their say so and their say so alone, without consulting the town, they can release that deed restriction?” he asked. “If that is the suggestion, that is duplicitous in the extreme.”
Feinberg then replied. “No, what I said was that because there was a separate agreement between the Sisters and the Town, related to the sewer, while the deed restriction itself is signed by them and those limitations, we need the Town to sign off on it. We cannot do it alone.”
It was not clear from Feinberg’s second comment what she felt the applicant “needed the Town to sign off” on — the removal of a deed restriction or just the permission to continue using the sewer access point.
At that point, Tomasetti reiterated that Town Counsel would be weighing in on the topic and the topic of the deed restriction was tabled, for now.
Looking Ahead
At the end of the hearing, Tomasetti encouraged Feinberg to have the project return for a second pre-app discussion at some point. The project will also be heard at the WPCA on Wednesday, May 21, where further discussion of the sewer access and its relationship to the deed restriction is expected. At some point, the project will also go to the Inland Wetlands Commission for review, because a large portion of the property is in a restricted zone, but this may not take place until the formal review begins.
Elsewhere on Monday night, the Commission began a discussion about whether to allow certain small restaurant uses to be approved without a special permit and public hearing process. Wrinn pointed to the relocation of The Painted Cookie to Wilton Center in 2023 as an example of a small business that was made to go through an extensive (and expensive) legal process for a fairly minor impact. He and Commissioners agreed to review the procedures being used by nearby towns for reference.
Wrinn also announced that the town received five responses to the Commission’s request for proposals to update and modernize Wilton’s zoning regulations. The bids range in cost from $90,000 to $170,000. The Commission will discuss the proposals in executive session over the next month and hope to send a selected proposal to the Board of Selectmen for approval in June.
The next meeting of the Planning & Zoning Commission is scheduled for Tuesday, May 27 and is expected to allow public comments on 118 Old Ridgefield Rd.