Weeks after real estate organizations in New Canaan abandoned the widely discussed effort, the town’s legislative body is looking into what it might do to create a ban, at least temporarily, on ‘For Sale’ signs here.
Town Councilman Steve Karl said that members of a committee he helps lead will meet with the chairman of the Planning & Zoning Commission to study how Greenwich accomplished its own ban “because if we want to get this thing going, we are going to have to mirror what Greenwich did.”
“And it is sort of a halfway agreement between the real estate offices and with the town,” said Karl, co-chair of the Council’s Bylaws and Ordinances Committee. Saying prospective homebuyers identify properties online and that ridding New Canaan of hundreds of ‘For Sale’ signs would improve the town’s appearance, the New Canaan Board of Realtors, with support from the New Canaan Multiple Listing Service, announced in June that a six-month “trial ban” would start in July. But before the month was out, the plan was scrapped. Officials said the turnaround came following talks with the National and State Associations of Realtors. At the Town Council’s most recent meeting, held July 18 at Town Hall, Chairman John Engel asked Karl whether a new effort to realize a ban was “on the burner” and he replied that it was.
Asked about it, Karl said that even with a re-worded ordinance or regulation, there likely would need to be wide agreement among real estate professionals to effective rid New Canaan of the pervasive signs (there are hundreds of residential properties on the market).
It isn’t clear whether the matter is best addressed in New Canaan through an ordinance or a zoning regulation. Continue Reading →
