Subcommittee named to delve into Wilton zoning

WILTON — The Planning and Zoning Commission spent its special meeting on July 8 discussing forming a subcommittee to handle certain zoning issues. Chairman Richard Tomasetti briefly recapped the commission’s conversation at its previous meeting that led to a decision to take on some of the burden of regulatory reforms in the town going forward. The commission then brainstormed areas to be considered for future reform, narrowing down the ideal areas of immediate focus to the Danbury Road corridor, noting that the area comprises a number of different zones, to perhaps be followed by Wilton Center. Reference was made to the most recent Plan of Conversation and Development, which the commission believes would provide a good roadmap. Also discussed was how to view the Danbury Road corridor holistically and to be mindful of impacts that regulation changes might have along the entire corridor. The town’s ongoing efforts are to provide sufficient affordable housing and housing diversity in town. The general agreement was that the first area of consideration/focus should be the Danbury Road corridor from the Norwalk/Wilton line up to Cannondale. With many applications for projects along Danbury Road, the commissioners thought that would be the best place to start. The commissioners also determined it might be worthwhile to include a review of surrounding town regulations in its review as well. Commissioner Florence Johnson suggesting looking at Darien for ideas. “I think having these meetings will be good, since it’s hard to have creative conversations after the regular meetings,” Commissioner Christopher Pagliaro said. It was the consensus of the Commission to set up a subcommittee comprised of the executive board, which includes Chairman Richard Tomasetti, Vice Chair Melissa Rotini, Secretary Doris Knapp and commission member Christopher Pagliaro. “We want to keep this smooth,” said Tomasetti. With this subcommittee, the members will meet on Wednesdays, on the opposite weeks of the main planning and zoning meetings. Wednesdays were chosen so as to not conflict with any other town meetings that members may be involved with. This subcommittee will identify zoning issues on the Danbury Road corridor and ultimately propose recommendations to the commission as a whole for further discussion with the understanding that the process would eventually also involve input from other town commissions/boards as well as the public. It was agreed that all such subcommittee meetings would be electronically conducted and publicly recorded via Zoom. At the end of the meeting, the commission determined that the proposed subcommittee would meet on Wednesdays between its two regularly scheduled meetings, and that a short synopsis of each meeting would be provided by the subcommittee, when appropriate, to the commission at large during its regularly scheduled meetings.

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