Groton Open Space Association

Appellate Unit Won’t Review GOSA Appeal On Four Winds Site Plan

HARTFORD — The Appellate Court has declined to review GOSA’s latest challenge to the proposed Four Winds “Residential Life Care Community,” which would be situated on 105 acres of the 160-acre Watrous property off Noank-Ledyard Road.

GOSA had asked the court to review the decision Dec. 23, 2005, by Superior Court Judge Joseph J. Purtill upholding the Planning Commission’s approval of the 147-unit project’s site plan. Earlier, the Appellate Court had refused to hear GOSA’s appeals of Judge Purtill’s endorsement of approvals by the Inland Wetlands Agency and Zoning Commission.

GOSA said it is “studying several options” following the latest refusal, which was dated March 23, 2006.

Still pending is a lawsuit by would-be developer Ron Bonvie against the Inland Wetlands Agency. The suit is aimed at eliminating two conditions placed on the development by the IWA. These were: denial of a wetlands crossing, and imposition of a road-closing schedule that was designed to protect migrating salamanders. The schedule had been agreed to by the developer in IWA hearings. However, the developer’s attorney, Thomas Londregan, in effect reserved the right to withdraw the salamander protection if the then-pending Avalon Bay Supreme Court decision eventually rendered the protection legally unnecessary. The question of whether Avalon Bay does allow developers to disregard wildlife in habitats outside the wetlands boundaries remains a subject of disagreement. State legislation adopted June 4, 2004, empowers agencies to consider wildlife inside wetlands. Judge Purtill upheld Mr. Bonvie’s appeal, but the town appealed the judge’s decision, and the Appellate Court agreed to review it.

Mr. Bonvie developed the Southport active adult community in Mashpee, MA. His record there as a developer has been marked by controveries with Mashpee’s planning department.