Remembering Who

Said What On Fairfield Hills

To the Editor:

I am bewildered by recent letters suggesting that our present first selectman, Herb Rosenthal, spearheaded the effort to purchase Fairfield Hills for the town. I am further bewildered by recent letters that have attempted to repaint the facts surrounding the failure of Ruby Johnson, the true moving force behind the purchase of Fairfield Hills by the town, to seek a second term on the Legislative Council from District 3. 

I note an article (“Purchase Fairfield Hills? Wasserman Says It’s the Way”) in the February 26, 1999, Newtown Bee, in which Julia Wasserman is pictured as “outspoken in her wish to see the town purchase the 186-acre core campus,” while First Selectman Herb Rosenthal is stated to have “expressed his reluctance to pursue the purchase.” The article records that at the time Mr Rosenthal felt “the deal as being too expensive” and believed that “private redevelopment of the land is the kind of economic development this town needs.” His reluctance to purchase Fairfield Hills is reiterated in an August 13, 1999, article in The Newtown Bee (“Visions For Fairfield Hills, Part IV – A Town-Owned Fairfield Hills: Crowning Glory or Crown of Thorns”) wherein he is said “not [to] favor purchasing the buildings and hanging on to them for future use” but rather, supporting the development of the property by one of the developers (either alone or in “partnership” with the town). As late as June 30, 2000, The Newtown Bee reports (in an article entitled: “Residents Press For A Decision on Fairfield Hills”) that the first selectman supported commercial development at the site.

I for one remember in the summer of 1999 joining Ruby Johnson’s “Save Fairfield Hills for Newtown” committee after attending the Republican Caucus wherein it was expressed by members of the caucus that the Rosenthal administration had no interest in buying Fairfield Hills, and that it was pretty much a lost cause. It was State Representative Julia Wasserman who suggested that I contact Ruby Johnson who she characterized as the remaining moving force behind the movement to purchase the property. I still remember marching with Ruby Johnson under the “Save Fairfield Hills for Newtown” banner in the 1999 Labor Day Parade strongly believing at the time that we were invoking the ire of First Selectman Rosenthal. We gathered nearly 1,000 signatures that day from the public in support of the purchase (very few people did not sign the petition when approached by us).

The most recent rewriting of history suggests that Ruby Johnson on her own accord decided not to seek a second term on the Legislative Council from District 3. As iterated in a recent letter to The Newtown Bee by Ruby Johnson herself, the latter is far from the truth. The fact is the Democratic Party did not endorse her as a candidate this year, most probably due to the wrangling between Ms Johnson and Mr Rosenthal over the future of the Fairfield Hills property. On the one hand, there is Ms Johnson who sees the property as a trust for Newtown’s future, while on the other hand, there is Mr Rosenthal who sees the property as an economic development opportunity. It is clear that the present “powers that be” in the town will not support dissenting ideas, however noble they may be.

I am very proud that people in this town did not vote their own pocketbooks in deciding whether to purchase Fairfield Hills, a 186-acre parcel that lays in the geographical center of the town. Ruby Johnson and Julia Wasserman were right in their convictions that most people in this town would be willing to give something of themselves for a better future for their children, and their children’s children, much as had been done by the citizenry of New York in the late 1800s in establishment of what is now known as “Central Park.” I think we owe both a round of applause, and I sincerely hope Ruby Johnson’s constituency lets the “powers that be” know of their displeasure in failing to endorse her for a second term.

Steven J. Moore

58 Butterfield Road, Newtown                                    October 17, 2001