In their role as the planning agency for the Borough of Newtown, town Planning & Zoning Commission (P&Z) members on Thursday, November 7, are slated to discuss and make recommendations to the Borough Zoning Commission (BZC) about a controversial proposed redevelopment project involving the construction of a rental apartment complex at 19 Main Street, where the former Inn at Newtown has stood vacant since January 2016.

The P&Z meeting is scheduled to start at 7:30 pm at Newtown Municipal Center, 3 Primrose Street. Because the borough has no planning agency, the P&Z functions in that role.

The P&Z members’ review of the redevelopment proposal will involve their interpretation of the 2014 Town Plan of Conservation and Development’s section that covers the borough. If the P&Z makes a negative recommendation to the BZC, the BZC would be required to have four out of its five members, instead of three out of five members, vote in the affirmative in order to approve the developer’s initial application for the project.

In that application, a development firm known as 19 Main Street LLC seeks to create two regulatory mechanisms which would then allow it to apply to construct 40 rental apartments within three proposed buildings at the 3.002-acre site.

The developer is seeking a “text amendment” to the borough zoning regulations, which would add wording to those rules providing for a Borough Residential Overlay District (BROD). The BROD wording would specify rules on high-density multifamily construction. Also, the developer is seeking a “zone map amendment,” through which the BROD zoning regulations would be applied to 19 Main Street as the site for a multifamily complex. The site now has Residential (R) zoning.

At an October 3 P&Z session, at which the multifamily topic arose, P&Z Chairman Don Mitchell told about 15 audience members that the P&Z’s discussion of the redevelopment project was not the subject of a P&Z public hearing, so the audience could not verbally comment, but could listen, and also could submit written comments. The chairman then continued matter to November 7 and advised P&Z members to review any written public comments before then.

Before the October 3 P&Z session, two local attorneys who own property on Main Street — Eric DaSilva and Robert Hall — had submitted letters to the P&Z voicing strong opposition to the redevelopment proposal, with both men charging that the project is inconsistent with the Town Plan. Mr DaSilva also submitted a petition bearing the names of roughly 300 people in opposition to the proposal.

In an October 16 letter to the P&Z, attorney Peter Olson, representing the developer, explains why the redevelopment proposal is consistent with the Town Plan.

As required by state law, the P&Z formulates a Town Plan every ten years to provide a land use planning framework for the town/borough for the coming decade. Typically, the P&Z spends two or more years creating such a plan.

The Borough Zoning Commission has changed the date and location of the public hearing that it will hold on 19 Main Street LLC’s dual application for the BROD zoning regulations and for applying such BROD regulations to 19 Main Street. That session is slated for 7 pm on Thursday, November 14, in the Alexandria Room at Edmond Town Hall, 45 Main Street. Public comments will be heard at that session.

On October 12, a firm known as DWR Company III LLC, which owns 19 Main Street, sponsored a public informational session on its redevelopment proposal. About 45 people attended.

The developer’s spokesmen said they want to design a project that fits the Main Street locale and solicited suggestions on how to do so from those attending. So far, a conceptual plan for the project has been created, but there is no engineered plan. An engineered plan would follow the BZC’s approval of the initial application.

On October 12, the developers’ spokesmen, however, heard stiff opposition from some of those in the audience who do not want a rental apartment complex built at the site, when considering the property’s history, the traffic implications, and its location on Main Street amid a neighborhood comprised mostly of single-family houses.

The developers said their concept involves high quality rental apartments which would have two bedrooms and two and one-half baths each. Monthly rents would range from about $2,500 to $3,000.

According to a “conceptual site plan” submitted to the BZC, the proposed 40 apartments would each be approximately 1,200 square feet in floor area. Thus, the complex would contain about 48,000 square feet of living space. Also, there would be a total of 72 parking spaces, of which 22 spaces would be in the form of garage space on the bottom level of a larger apartment building located at the rear of the site. The other 50 parking spaces would be located outdoors behind two smaller apartment buildings positioned at the front of the site.