To The Editor:

Mr Gaston’s response, rich with hyperbole, demonstrates how fruitless it is to try to settle legal issues in these sorts of exchanges.

Despite apparent strawman arguments, there is no attempt to “attack” or “charge” Main Street residents as I have proposed no language, only that our representative legislative body should have sent the permitting question to committee. In fact, in my original public comment (sent, 6/30/25) I suggested examples of cost accommodations to not burden organizations. His statement is also misguided as he knows that any theoretical permitting ordinance would apply to all of Newtown, not just his street, and that the events in question draw people from outside of town, such as Southbury Justice, Bethel Democrats, and the Danbury Area Justice Network, while costs, traffic and parking concerns do primarily fall on our residents.

In Newtown, we have a Legislative Council made up of our elected representatives, vested by our Charter with the power to write ordinances as allowed under the state’s home rule statute. For these types of debates the Council has an Ordinance sub-committee that exists to research, review and make recommendations to the full Council in an organized and public process, recorded in their minutes for posterity. I know because I served on that committee for a decade and we did extensive work including soliciting diverse opinions from the public, experts, our Town Attorney, and various organizations such as the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities before making recommendations.

Instead, this speculative debate is being held in the court of public opinion. As such, I would encourage anyone still following along, the jury of our peers, to search “constitutionality of municipal event permitting” and draw your own conclusions. The first hit on google was from the Georgetown Law School’s constitutionalprotestguide.org, followed by an informative article from the Free Speech Center at Middle Tennessee State University, both were edifying for my letters.

We each have a First Amendment right to express frustrations with our government, even if Mr Gaston feels he needs to defend their inaction. This tiring debate would have been unnecessary had our elected representatives on the Council taken up the request and researched the need and issues, reconciling input from all perspectives for their own public deliberations; here we have come full circle to my original thesis.

Ryan Knapp

Sandy Hook