State Grant Cuts Town’s Cost To Acquire Laurel Trail Open Space

By Andrew Gorosko

The state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has awarded an open space acquisition grant to the town to be used to defray the cost of the town’s recent purchase of 17.6 acres of forestland along the Lake Zoar section of the Housatonic River in Sandy Hook.

The state will provide Newtown with a $157,500 grant toward its $348,200 purchase of land at 38 Laurel Trail. The town bought the 17.6 acres from Timothy Goergen of Norwalk last spring. The state grant will cover approximately 45 percent of the property’s purchase price, reducing the town’s cost to $190,700.

The parcel is heavily wooded with hemlock and other tree species. It has very steep slopes that lead down to the Lake Zoar shoreline. The property has trails that interconnect with other local open space areas.

The property lies along the Lake Zoar shoreline, just upriver of the Rochambeau Bridge on Interstate 84. The acreage has 1,594 linear feet of lake shoreline and is situated between the developed sections of Riverside and Pootatuck Park.

Town Conservation Official Rob Sibley sought the grant on behalf of the town. Governor M. Jodi Rell and DEP Commissioner Gina McCarthy awarded the grant in ceremonies November 17 in Norwalk. The state awarded $6.8 million in open space grants to 24 Connecticut municipalities toward the purchase of approximately 2,000 acres of open space.

Since the state’s open space grant program started in 1998, it has provided more than $70 million toward the acquisition of approximately 20,000 acres of open space, according to DEP.

Also on November 17, the state awarded the Southbury Land Trust more than $330,000 toward acquiring the 41-acre Pootatuck Brook property at Mitchell Farm near Lake Zoar.

First Selectman Herb Rosenthal said November 21 the town acquired the Laurel Trail property for passive forms of public recreation, such as nature hikes. The municipal acquisition will keep the area scenic and prevent it from being developed with houses, he said. The property potentially might have yielded three home sites on the high ground overlooking Lake Zoar, he said.

Mr Rosenthal said the town will build a small parking area to provide hikers with a place to park vehicles when they use the trail network through the woods. That parking area would be constructed off the street known as Laurel Trail in the Riverside section of Sandy Hook.