Earth Day, a worldwide celebration that takes place every April, is a time when we make a commitment to protecting the environment and promote environmental awareness. Many of us are aware of the many ways we can do our part to help the Earth, such as recycling, carpooling and composting. We should be aware of the unintended effects of legislative initiatives that may have negative impacts on our environment health. This is especially true if proposed laws do not include environmental stakeholders and eliminate the possibility of local control over land-use decisions. Land is a local thing. Local officials should make decisions about land development. They should also be accountable to residents, who know the best how the environment will accommodate them.
There have been several bills in Connecticut over the past two years that aim to increase housing development throughout the state. Most of these bills, however, also restrict or remove local control over land-use decisions or place a large mandate for development without regard to environmental concerns. These bills include HB 5429, HB 5204, and are currently in the General Assembly. These bills, if they are passed, could lead to almost exponential growth in our communities. Although these bills are intended to encourage affordability, they ignore the devastating effects of extreme development mandates on local historical and environmental protection.
HB 5429, a transit oriented development bill (TOD), would eliminate the public hearing process. This would silence the public and local planning officials as well as me. The first line of defense in protecting our natural resources is the Zoning Commissions. This bill would allow dense development within a mile of transit centers. This would create thousands more housing units. HB 5204, also known as the fair share bill, would allow for an arbitrary allocation to affordable housing units to each municipality using a formula that housing development advocates will devise. Some towns would need to build thousands more units.
We all know that climate change, including rising sea level, is a fact. Our coastal communities will be the first to experience its devastating effects. ToD would require an intensified increase in residential development around our train stations. These stations are located primarily on our coastlines. This includes Metro North’s New Haven line, and the Shore Line East. The World Economic Forum says that while scientists aren’t sure how fast or how high the sea level will rise, they believe it could destroy acres of land, and cause billions in losses. We should not force excessive population growth along the coasts. They could become disaster areas and require more infrastructure to support the new development.
We should also not pass laws that restrict state residents’ ability promote responsible stewardship for our natural resources. This is what would happen if we ban public hearings. Residents would be severely limited in their ability to use the 22a-19 intervention law to raise historic and environmental preservation issues. Public hearings and environmental interventions allow local officials to be fully informed about adverse impacts that may not otherwise be known. It is vital that local officials are able to hold hearings on proposed development projects so that decisions can be made with due consideration for the local ecology, topography and wildlife habitat needs. Local residents are often witnesses to the need for protection of parcels of land that have resources or wildlife habitat. The TOD bill effectively blocks public hearings about individual development projects. However, the “fair share” bill would impose such a high standard for development that towns would have no choice but to de-prioritize open spaces preservation in order to meet the new housing requirements.
I urge all state residents not only to consider what you can do in the home and business to protect our environment health, but also to be aware and question proposed laws that would silence you or exclude experts and environmental stakeholders from the process. These bills and others were not designed with ecological considerations in mind. They must be stopped from becoming law. It is irrevocable that land is lost, along with all the ecological benefits it provides. The goals of protecting the environment and expanding housing diversity do not have to be mutually exclusive. We can and must do better at achieving both without compromising one.
This Earth Day, please urge all your legislators to oppose these bills and to ask them, when drafting new laws to provide equal protection for our open spaces, our coastal communities and our wildlife habitats, as well as all of our historical and environmental resources.
Sincerely,
Alexis Harrison
Fairfield, Fairfield’s town plan and zoning commission