Board of Selectmen

Town Approves New Fees for Restaurants Offering Outdoor Seating on Public Property

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Saying it’s a more sensible system, town officials on Tuesday approved new fees for restaurants offering outdoor dining in downtown New Canaan. The Board of Selectmen also voted in favor of edits to the town’s “Sidewalk Café Guidelines” (see the meeting’s public packet here) by getting rid of a section that says businesses can’t encroach more than seven feet onto the sidewalk—a rule that restaurants with newly wider sidewalks are violating—as well as noting that a four-foot-wide pedestrian pathway must be maintained on the sidewalk as per ADA. Town Planner Sara Carey, who proposed the changes to the selectmen, noted that currently the town charges a “$300 flat fee regardless of how many seats you had” for outdoor dining. “I don’t think that’s necessarily how we should operate anymore if we are allowing people to bump out more than seven feet under the sidewalk, so I’ve proposed a sliding scale,” Carey told the selectmen at their regular meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference. Under the new system, those with up to 15 seats will pay $400 per season (April through October), those with 16 to 30 seats $800 and those with 31-plus seats $1,600.

Board of Selectmen

Survey: New Canaan’s Top Priority for Next 10 Years Is Continued Support of Schools

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Locals rank Waveny Park and New Canaan Library as the most-visited facilities in town, while saying that New Canaan’s top priority over the next 10 years is the continued support and improvement of the public school system, according to a recent survey. And while stakeholders are largely content with the quality of life in New Canaan—rating it 8.5 out of 10—reliable cell phone service, traffic congestion, road maintenance and speeding are the top four quality-of-life concerns, according to 2,306 survey responses gathered by a Cheshire-based consulting firm. The total survey responses “equates to about 11% of the town, which is huge,” Town Planner Sarah Carey told members of the Board of Selectmen at their regular meeting, held Dec. 19 at Town Hall and via videoconference. “The goal is 4% so we blew that out of the water, which was great,” Carey said.

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P&Z To Weigh Change to Allowable Heights of Retaining Walls

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In the past three years, the town has issued 25 permits for retaining walls higher than four feet, including 10 over six feet, though one section of the New Canaan Zoning Regulations outright forbids retaining walls taller than four feet in Residential and Special Zones, officials say. At the same time, another section of the regulations states that retaining walls higher than four feet simply require a zoning permit, Town Planner Sarah Carey noted in a memo ahead of the Planning & Zoning Commission’s regular meeting at 6 p.m Tuesday. 

“It is recommended that we clean up this regulation to take a clear position on the permitted height of retaining walls in Residential and Special Zones,” Carey wrote in the memo, which forms part of the public packet for the meeting. 

“Staff recommends that there be no height limit on retaining walls but rather a special permit be required in certain instances,” she said. The discrepancy—in Section 6.5.B of the regulations (page 153 here)—recently was brought to the attention of town staff, Carey said. In the past three years, the town has permitted retaining walls higher than four feet in Residential Zones, she said, “sometimes administratively, sometimes requiring a special permit.”

“The Commission in 2022 granted at least 2 Special Permits that had proposed retaining walls over 4ft in height in Residential Zones,” Carey said, citing properties on Brushy Ridge Road and Oenoke Ridge. To address the discrepancy, P&Z will consider text amendments to Section 6.5.B.

Government

Town Seeks Public Input on POCD via Online Survey

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Town officials are asking for the public’s input in a community-wide survey as they prepare to update the major guiding document for land use decisions in New Canaan. By state law, the Plan of Conservation and Development must be updated every 10 years. In New Canaan, the POCD underwent its most recent major update in 2014. The document informs P&Z “of how we should alter or stay the course” in the appointed body’s decision-making, said Town Planner Sarah Carey. 

She continued: “This is your chance as a member of the public to give us your opinion of: What are we doing well as a town? What do we need to improve on?

Government

Town To Advise on YMCA Landscape Screening After Neighbor Complains

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Town officials are reviewing the landscape screening between the New Canaan YMCA and a neighbor, after the latter filed a complaint that the South Avenue organization is out of compliance with its Special Permit requirements. Putnam Road resident Roger Williams said in an Aug. 23 letter to the Planning & Zoning Commission that in nearly 30 years he’s seen the Y grow its program and facility significantly. “What was a successful local YMCA when we moved in has become a very large regional YMCA, especially with the closures of the Stamford YMCA and Norwalk YMCA facilities,” Williams said in the letter. “Each time the Y has requested its expansions, they promised to install landscaping and screening and to maintain both to lessen its impact on the neighbors.