ZBA chairman explains meeting cancellation

Correction/clarification, 4:10 p.m.: Second email was from Rich Bonenfant.

NORWALK, Conn. — A mistake led to the cancellation of Thursday’s Zoning Board of Appeals hearing, ZBA Chairman Andy Conroy said Friday.

Commissioner Keith Lyon sent an email to a Zoning Inspector Aline Rochefort, telling her he agreed with her decision to deny Firetree LTD a Certificate of Occupancy for its Quintard Avenue facility, Conroy said. Since his mind was made up before the end of the hearing, Firetree demanded that he recuse himself, according to Conroy.

Firetree also asked Conroy to recuse himself, but he refused, he said.

Lyon did not respond to a request for comment.

“It’s not any great crime,” Conroy said, but the goal is to be as fair as possible and, “You can’t be fair if you have made your mind up already.”

Quintard Avenue residents on Friday speculated that Firetree had stepped in at the last minute with legal maneuvering, causing the hearing to be cancelled.

Lyon’s email was provided to Firetree as a normal part of the process, with Planning and Zoning and the Zoning Board of Appeals following proper procedures, Conroy said.

He didn’t know when Firetree received the email, he said.

Some would have thought it possible for Lyon to apologize and promise to take in additional information, but Conroy doesn’t think that acceptable, he said.

“The bell is rung, so we’re not going to go in that direction,” Conroy said. “Lyon didn’t want to go that direction either, he feels the same way I do about it. He made a mistake and the mistake excludes him from continuing on the Board at this particular hearing. Board members occasionally screw up.”

Firetree demanded that Conroy recuse himself because he forwarded an email from Common Councilman Rich Bonenfant (R-At Large), objecting to the halfway house, to the entire Board and two staff members who are involved, Conroy said.

“I said no, I wouldn’t do that. We follow procedures,” Conroy said.

In this case, the procedure is to forward an email to all other Board members. Forwarding the email doesn’t indicate agreement with it; Bonenfant has as much right to express an opinion as any other Norwalk citizen, and could not attend the meeting because he had a Council meeting to attend, Conroy said.

Some would say you could pretend you didn’t see the email, but then there’s the possibility that someone would dredge up the email, he said.

Conroy said he’d spoken to several attorneys about his forwarding of Bonenfant’s email.

“None of them could not see a reason in the world that counsel would ask me to recuse myself,” Conroy said. ‘”… I think I am being eminently fair. For me to be wrong, for his email not to be treated like everyone else’s would mean Rich doesn’t have the ability to express himself.”

Firetree is going to “come up with 50,000 more things,” Conroy said.

“I think they’re already figuring that they’re going to court,” Conroy said. “Not that we are prejudging, they have decided that’s how it’s going to turn out. So, they are behaving that way and that’s unfortunate because I don’t know that that’s the outcome.”

He is trying to set up the continuation of the hearing on May 25, but is not certain he has enough Commissioners available, he said.

The five-member Board has three alternates. Conroy had Commissioner Lee Levey, an alternate, sit through part one of the public hearing to try to cover absences, but Lyon’s recusal gave him too many empty chairs, Conroy said, explaining that one member has been out of town.

A quorum would be three members but the goal is five members present, he said. Other alternates could catch up on the issue by listening to a recording of the first part of the public hearing.

Although the public can speak to the Board when the hearing resumes, the written comment period is closed, Conroy said, explaining that, “I didn’t, as chairman, extend that.”