Around Town

Despite Court’s Decisions, Lawsuits Tie Up Restoration of Ponus Ridge Chapel

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Though a judge this month found that town zoning officials acted properly in granting a variance designed to allow for the restoration of a long-neglected chapel on Ponus Ridge, the historic structure’s fate is unclear, as it remains tied up in multiple lawsuits brought by a New Canaan woman. In a decision issued April 11, Superior Court Judge Charles Lee affirmed the New Canaan Zoning Board of Appeals’ unanimous vote three years ago to allow for the rehabilitation of the legally nonconforming, 1911-built Ponus Ridge Chapel (see Lee’s full decision at the end of this article). Plans call for the conversion of the dilapidating structure into a guesthouse by its neighbors to the south, the Hayeses, with an easement to the chapel property at 424 Ponus Ridge for a parking space and septic system (at .14 acres, the chapel’s lot is itself too small). The president of the association that owns the building, now deceased, in 2012 had entered into an agreement with the Hayeses whereby the property would be transferred to them, in a complicated arrangement also involving New Canaan Library, following the organization’s dissolution. However, another member of the Ponus Ridge Chapel and Community Association—a group that hasn’t met in decades (the chapel itself hasn’t been used in 40-plus years)—neighbor Elizabeth Weed of 434 Ponus Ridge, filed two lawsuits designed to halt the proposed transaction.

Government

‘They Don’t Feel Comfortable’: Officials Urge Grace Farms, Neighbors To Reach Agreement on Screening Between Properties

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Saying a next-door neighbor’s backyard is overly exposed to people visiting the hugely popular, multi-use 80-acre Grace Farms property and buildings, officials on Monday night urged the two parties to work through their differences and try to reach a mutually acceptable screening plan. The 2-story Colonial at 1218 Smith Ridge Road sits on 4.14 acres adjacent to and downgrade from the southeast corner of Grace Farms, which opened to the public in the fall. New Canaanites “are all beneficiaries” of Grace Farms, Zoning Board of Appeals Chairman Carroll Yanicelli said at the group’s regular monthly meeting, held at Town Hall. “I love it. I love going there.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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New Canaan Fire Department and NCPD Animal Control officials at 10:51 a.m. Saturday responded to a report of a dog who’d wandered into a storm drain in the area of Country Club and Lambert Roads. They arrived to discover that a young Newfoundland had crawled back out, to reunite with its owner. ***

The Building Department on April 20 received an application from the 136 Main St. to do some $50,000 of interior renovations at the former Barolo space, slated to open this spring as Spiga Café, an Italian restaurant. Work in the 4,100-square-foot space includes installation of a new bar and equipment, pizza oven and lighting.

Government

‘I Do Not Appreciate Being Put In the Position We Are In Now’: Zoning Board Grudgingly OKs Variance on Silvermine

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Scolding a contractor for moving forward with construction work on a Silvermine Road house without proper authorization, zoning officials on Monday night grudgingly approved a variance that will allow the building project to continue. Fred Nigri told members of the Zoning Board of Appeals that what started as an interior renovation (basically, a master bedroom and bathroom overhaul) at 406 Silvermine Road evolved into a larger project when workers discovered mold and rotted framing at the 1948-built Cape. Specifically, Nigri on an architect’s advice and with the homeowner’s consent, installed a pitched roof where a flat roof had existed (for several reasons, see below)—a change that required approval from the ZBA because it’s located closer to a side-yard setback than the 35 feet allowed (see page 58 of the Zoning Regulations here, the home is in the 2-acre zone). “We had to make a decision because after we had the roof off, it was open, it would have been all open, so rather than put a tarp over it or whatever, after discussing it, we did enclose it, so that this way the house was not all the way open,” Nigri told the ZBA during the group’s regular monthly meeting, held in a board room at Town Hall. Yet that work was not permitted and is now at least partially finished, board member John Mahoney noted, putting the ZBA “in an awkward situation, where we now either have to grant it—in part, because it is there—or we would have to ask you to remove it.”

Nigri responded that it was not his intention to put the board in a difficult spot.

Government

‘This Is Just Shocking’: Neighbors Voice Opposition to Plans for Larger Home on Oddly Shaped Jelliff Mill Road Lot

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Saying the new owners of an oddly shaped parcel on Jelliff Mill Road knew what they were getting in acquiring the property, and objecting specifically to the size of a proposed new dwelling there, neighbors during a public hearing on Monday night voiced opposition to the plan. Specifically, in more than doubling the size of the 1.5-story, 1,200-square-foot cottage that sits now at 335 Jelliff Mill Road, a taller, slightly wider structure proposed for the long, narrow lot (60 feet wide and 744 feet long) would be exacerbating what already is a nonconforming structure, neighbors told members of the Zoning Board of Appeals at their regular monthly meeting. The neighbor to the west, Richard Lurie, told the ZBA that “if you say ‘Yes’ to this request, when would you ever say ‘No’?”

“In other words, everybody who is living next to a non-conforming piece of property in this town, if somebody buys it, they can use the nonconforming aspect as the hardship and then have the right to make the property more nonconforming and therefore degrading the values of the properties around them,” Lurie said during the hearing, held in a board room at Town Hall. “How would you ever say ‘No’? Because if they bought a piece of property with the non-conforming aspect as a justification to make it more non-conforming and to the detriment of the neighbors and the value of the neighbors’ houses.”

He added: “I believe the objective of P&Z is to ensure that zoning laws are followed and that you bring properties more into conforming not letting them be more non-conforming which is what is happening right here.