A New Town Hall For Newtown?

By Steve Bigham

Shelton House at Fairfield Hills was the temporary home of Newtown’s library a few years ago when the Cyrenius H. Booth building was being renovated and expanded. By next year, it may become the permanent home to the town’s municipal offices.

This week, First Selectman Herb Rosenthal recommended the renovation of the 60,000 square foot building to house all town offices, including the Board of Education and those currently located at Edmond Town Hall. His plan to use Shelton House was unveiled Monday just moments after the completion of negotiations with the state over the town purchase of Fairfield Hills.

Shelton House has been described as the centerpiece of Fairfield Hills and can easily be seen directly ahead by those traveling through the entry plaza – a suitable location, many believe, for a new Newtown town hall. The building is adjacent to Woodbury and Newtown halls, two of the most aesthetically appealing buildings on the campus, which may eventually be used for small professional offices and commercial uses.

“The town has always looked at this area as the most historical part of Fairfield Hills. I think it goes a long way toward what a lot of people talked about in preserving that green area,” Mr Rosenthal said.

Shelton House is the only building Mr Rosenthal plans to “go forward with” at this time.

“That’s my idea at this point in time. Maybe when they do the master plan they’ll find that it isn’t the best way to go. But it looks like Shelton Hall because of the size of the building is the best way to go.”

The estimated cost to renovate the massive building is $6 million.

At one point, the Fairfield Hills advisory committee had advocated the use of the 58,000-square-foot Stamford Hall, and while it has enough space to take care of the town’s needs at the present time, it does not provide enough room for expansion, Mr Rosenthal said.

The idea of moving town offices out of Edmond Town Hall has been a source of discussion over the years as town officials have tried to determine if such a move would violate the terms of the Mary Hawley trust fund for the town.

Miss Hawley provided the funding for the construction of the Main Street building back in the late 1920s and set aside money in her will to help maintain the building. With it came certain stipulations on how the buildings were to be used and what offices were to remain there. Mr Rosenthal is prepared to recommend that all town offices be moved to the 185-acre Fairfield Hills campus.

“I’ve talked with various attorneys. I don’t think it’s a big deal. I think at the most the town might lose some revenue, but that’s not even an issue,” Mr Rosenthal said.

The first selectman said the future of Edmond Town Hall could be “a nice community building the way Mary Hawley had intended it to be.” The building has a movie theater, gymnasium, the Alexandria Room, which can be used for special events, and plenty of space to accommodate quasi-government agencies such as Youth Services, Chamber of Commerce, etc.

“The Edmond Town Hall Board of Managers controls this building so they can use it for whatever they want to use it for, but certainly it would be available for cultural type uses,” Mr Rosenthal said.

As part of Mr Rosenthal’s recommendation, he has included $1 million worth of code updates to the town hall.

As for the rest of the buildings at Fairfield Hills, maintenance of each in anticipation of some re-use represents a substantial cost to the town. Therefore, the demolition of nine buildings and land banking of the rest is being considered.