Letter To The Editor: 'Stop State Control Of Our Local Zoning!'

To The Editor:

Our CT State Legislature is now considering a tangled web of bills that infringe upon our individual property rights and imperil our towns' local home rule – bills that turn these valuable and precious rights over to the state. These bills comprise a bad, one-size-fits all, “we know better” public policy that will have serious and harmful systemic impacts on our communities.

These bills don’t address social inequity, don’t provide for homeownership, and don’t provide for affordable housing. They don't provide any solutions for the extensive urban problems that are plaguing our cities. These bills prevent our zoning regulations from even considering important qualities such as town character and property values – and this will damage all towns in Connecticut. And these bills don’t account for water quality, a vitally important point with regard to my town of Easton CT, which supplies potable drinking water to more than 600,000 residents of Fairfield County.

Here is the bottom line: Look at the stable and sturdy financial conditions of our towns and compare them with the perilous financial condition of our state which our overwhelmingly Democrat state legislature wants to empower with zoning control over our towns. Why on earth would anyone want to turn our local zoning control over to the financially crippled State of Connecticut? Any politician who votes to do this should be voted straight out of office.

Grant Monsarrat

Easton, CT