Date: Fri 08-May-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: STEVEB

Quick Words:

council-ordinance-committee

Full Text:

Panel Starts Reworking Ordinance Drafting Procedures

BY STEVE BIGHAM

The town's ordinance committee met Wednesday night to begin the arduous task

of re-writing its rules and procedures for creating local laws.

In recent months, a handful of ordinances have come under fire by both

residents and town officials who claim the laws are flawed. In response,

ordinance committee chairman Will Rodgers called for a short-term moratorium

on all new ordinances until his committee can come up with a better process.

"We have to come up with some internal rules on how to go about drafting

ordinances. We need to get our house in order," Mr Rodgers said.

Mr Rodgers only recently took over the committee, and the other members - Ed

Lucas, Tim Holian and Peggy Baiad - are all new. The ordinance committee

consists of Legislative Council members.

In short, the new set of internal rules, as written by Mr Rogers, would better

guide the committee as it sets out to write new ordinances. The aim is to

ensure the ordinance committee consults with all the necessary paid experts in

town before passing any ordinances on to the Legislative Council.

"I don't want to go through the same problem that we had with the scenic road

ordinance," said Mr Lucas.

The council has been criticized profusely in recent weeks for its decision not

to approve scenic road status to New Lebbon and Washbrook roads. The

residents, excited about the new ordinance, believed they had met the criteria

and were angered at being rejected. An incomplete ordinance on scenic roads

may have been the root of the problem.

The scenic road ordinance was also knocked by Planning & Zoning Commission

Chairman Stephen Koch, who was surprised his board was never consulted during

the ordinance drafting. First Selectman Herb Rosenthal claimed the ordinance

might put an added burden on the town if, five years down the road, residents

of a scenic road start complaining about the road's poor condition. The

developer will be long gone and the repair work will be left up to the Public

Works Department, Mr Rosenthal said.

There may be other flawed ordinances, council members say, including some that

are still in the drafting phase. It has been several years since the council

first began work on an underground oil tank ordinance, which, according to

Fire Marshal George Lockwood, is drastically needed so that the town can begin

pulling up all the "leakers." The proposed ordinance is still a work in

progress.

Mr Lockwood wanted an ordinance mandating that all tanks 20 or more years old

be dug up. However, the law was almost passed simply prohibiting any more

tanks from being buried. This frustrated Mr Lockwood, who said a requirement

to dig up certain tanks was the most important part of the ordinance. He said

he was not properly consulted during the drafting of the ordinance.

Pierre Rochman said Wednesday that Mr Lockwood had been contacted as the

ordinance took shape.

Nevertheless, Mr Rodgers said a better system of contacting the proper town

agencies during the drafting period is essential. The committee spent much of

Wednesday trying to determine how best to contact the departments. Mr Lucas

suggested they be faxed. Mr Holian thought a legal notice in the local

newspaper would suffice. Mr Rodgers felt just announcing the news in the town

clerk's office would do the job. This discussion took up nearly 30 minutes,

and since the committee only had an hour to meet, it was unable to study the

entire ordinance drafting proposal. The group is slated to meet again next

Wednesday.

According to Mr Rodgers, his committee's next order of business, once the

internal rules are set, will be to complete an anti-litter ordinance. Work

started on the law nearly a year ago. However, Newtown police, the ones

expected to enforce the law, were never contacted. Rest assured, Mr Rodgers

said, they will be contacted this time.