Open Space

If you visit the shores of Western Connecticut's reservoirs. You are sure to find beautiful lapping waters. Wildlife in abundance and these days a healthy amount of controversy. Anybody who has been in Fairfield County or has lived in western Connecticut. Has a sense of the importance of open space. For our part of the world it is really a part of. The way we live and. Who we are. And. A big part of the protected open space in Fairfield County is owned by one company straight at the Connecticut fund for the environment is one of many upset over last January sale of Aquarium at the parent company of the Bridgeport hydraulic Company B eight C and its 18000 acres of land were sold to Caldera a multinational corporation based in England. And that sale prompted conservationists community groups and thousands of individuals to form the coalition for the permanent preservation of lands the acreage in dispute

it's found in 29 communities spanning Litchfield New Haven in Fairfield County. Before she was sold she and Easton had a quite close relationship we used west Salt on our road maintenance than many other towns do just to try to keep the watershed. Better and BHP in turn has been a good friend of the town in the past. The town of Easton hosts nearly 6000 acres of land within its borders. Close to 40 percent of its overall size. Obviously there are some differing interests. BHP has its interests to its parent corporation in England which doesn't have the close ties to Connecticut that the old BHP did and it has its obligations to the shareholders and to the owners of the company. I'm not an expert in the finance area but I've been told that the price that was paid by Caldera was extremely high. That led to concerns on the part of a number of people that

Calderon might attempt to recoup their investment by selling off land they didn't have any plans to sell our land any more than what had been already identified Aquarian owns about 18000 acres of land in the state of Connecticut. The vast majority of that. Some 13000 acres is watershed land used to supply and protect our watershed. We only have about 700 acres of surplus water. Good land. We plan on selling the sale of a lot of company land is a new concern for Connecticut communities. Foreign ownership of these companies however is. I think the idea of a foreign company moving in. Rightly or wrongly accurately or inaccurately scared many people into thinking they were going to have a very intense motivation for selling off as many lands as possible water company lands have been a very hot topic for many years. There was a state task force back in the 70s that was appointed to look into this whole issue they issued a very thick report. So I

think it's been a very hot issue for a long time. And I think this just intensified it. What's at stake conservationists say is not just 18000 acres owned by one company but the one hundred thirty thousand acres owned by water utility companies statewide with industry analysts predicting a trend in foreign giants like Hilda acquiring smaller water companies. Conservationists want greater protections in place beyond those now provided by state law. They're protected to some degree but not well enough because what we're concerned about is. The gradual development of these lands not not over the next two years necessarily but the next 10 20 30 years. And unless these lands are locked up for ever taken off the market protected legally so that they cannot be sold. We think that those sales could happen. So. The goal is permanent protection of every acre.

Here you can see the reservoir and the class 1 lands which are here in red are the lands that are directly in the watershed. The State Department of Environmental Protection is working together with county officials considering the possibilities for acquiring rights to kill the land. It is by all measures a landmark deal for a state once ranked last among its New England neighbors in open space procurement. Since Governor Rowland announced an open space. And this should have over two years ago. Forty four million dollars has been appropriated to DPF direct acquisition program. I'm very pleased with the progress that we've made in the last two years. We've been able to buy more land in each of the last two years than we have purchased in a generation. We purchased thirty five hundred acres of land. The year before last and last year. Thirty four hundred acres but 7000 acres acquired over a two year period pale in comparison to the lump sum nine thousand acres the EPA has targeted to protect in this one deal.

We're going to establish a system of priorities. Obviously we're not going be able to purchase all of this land in one fell swoop. But we're going to establish a system of priorities based on the natural resource value of the land and also based on its recreational use for the public the Nature Conservancy with its broad experience and conservation deals and private fundraising is serving as an advisor to the DP and the discussions. From our perspective as an organization that looks at land from an ecological viewpoint they've got some very important lands but I don't think we should make the mistake of saying that just because a piece of land is owned by a certain company automatically means it's more important than three hundred acres that. The joke that it is out and some other time. I think it's important to put their land into a broad context. Having said that it is a very important hold land holding that they have at this stage coalition members are troubled by two things about one quarter of the 18000 acres has failed to catch the interest of the land trusts looking to

acquire property rights. And the bigger worry is that the state can't possibly foot the bill for land it is looking to protect. It is after all property located in one of the most valuable real estate markets in the country and we applaud the state who for its work on this issue are concerned. About a deal to protect the wind is that it could involve vast sums of money. And the state has only indicated that it's interested in about 50 percent of the land. And there's no guarantee that the legislature will be able to come up with or want to come up with the tens or even more than 100 million dollars to protect all of this land. The coalition believes the solution lies in the establishment of a Regional Water Authority a nonprofit entity controlled by area towns state says the authority would buy back held his interest in the beach say paying for itself not with taxpayer money but with water rates currently charged to be H.S. customers. Some critics have their doubts.

We don't think that a public water authority is neither necessary nor appropriate particularly given the amount of progress that we've made since the beginning of the year. Also too. You have to look at who pays for this. Our customers would be asked to pay for this and why buy an entire water system when really all that's being asked here is the preservation of land. And we are working cooperatively with the state to make that happen. I really don't really care about what the corporate structure of killed. We're interested in protecting the land. And this is I think a tried and true way of doing it of engaging the company and buying the land while the coalition pursues a feasibility study for Regional Water Authority. The DPD and held away assessments on land targeted for protection. They're also considering funding options. We also are going to work with the company to ensure that you know we can get the best price possible and that may involve some less than interests. It

might involve purchases over time and it could involve donations. Other methods innovative methods for acquiring this land as well as just straight out purchase of these simple rights. We have indicated to the state that we're going to be very flexible in terms of financing this type of transaction. We said that we're willing to take a two discount the price of our land or donate some of it and take the tax credits for those donations or discounts. And it could be paid out over time we don't need all the money right up front so we're going to be very flexible as this killed off in terms of financing this transaction. Neither DP Nor Cal will hazard a guess on what the final land appraisal will turn out to be. But many observers speculate the price tag will be big. My hunch would be we'll all be a little stunned by the price when the appraisal start coming in. But I think we will be able to work. Out some sort of

deal perhaps for less land than we had hoped perhaps for more money than we had hoped. But I think some significant portion of their land will be able to be preserved by the state. Some municipalities and some nonprofit groups working together.