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Town plan under review
Oct 16, 2024
SALISBURY — Salisbury Planning and Zoning Commission met Monday, Oct. 7 to revise and incorporate public comments into the draft of the ten-year Plan of Conservation and Development (POCD), which is due to update this year.
Over the course of the three-hour meeting, P&Z meticulously combed every page of the 121-page document, addressing stylistic and formatting concerns alongside input gleaned from the public engagement meeting held on Sept. 30. At that meeting, the Commission fielded comments from the public on a draft of the document, both from a live audience and from written letters submitted prior to the workshop.
P&Z Chair Michael Klemens expressed his gratitude to the community for its participation in developing the document: “I’m very pleased with participation both at the public engagement meeting and through the written comments,” he said. He emphasized that the public commentary was very helpful in developing the draft to send out for review.
The POCD is “an advisory framework to address long-term community needs consistent with the Growth Management Principles of the State of Connecticut’s Conservation and Development Plan,” as per the Salisbury town website. Salisbury’s last POCD was approved in 2012, and Connecticut state law required municipalities to update the plan every decade. Due to Covid-19 related concerns, the town was granted until the end of 2024 to complete document, a deadline the commission must meet in order to ensure discretionary state funding.
P&Z submitted the edited document on schedule to the Northwest Hills Council of Governments and the Salisbury Board of Selectman for a statutory 65-day review period.
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Selectmen to discuss POCD
Oct 16, 2024
SALISBURY — There will be a special meeting of the Board of Selectmen Thursday, Oct. 24, 1 p.m. (hybrid) for the selectmen to discuss the Planning and Zoning Commission’s draft of the Plan of Conservation and Development.
The selectmen picked that date and time during the regular monthly selectmen’s meeting Monday, Oct. 9.
First Selectman Curtis Rand noted that as of Oct. 9 the selectmen had a first draft of the POCD. He said the board can accept or reject the entire thing, or sections of it.
“But we can’t do anything until we get the final draft.”
Rand said there will be a town meeting “soon” to handle several outstanding matters, including the town’s donation of a parcel of land on Undermountain Road and Grove Street to the Salisbury Housing Trust, combined with an easement giving control of the westernmost section of the parcel back to the town for open space.
The town meeting will also include funding for two new sidewalk tractors, additional remediation at the old transfer station site, and hydrilla-related funding for Twin Lakes.
The town meeting will include amending an existing ordinance to accurately reflect the cost of hooking up to town water and sewer. A separate matter of an encroachment on town property on Housatonic River Road might be on the town meeting agenda.
In the meantime, Rand said to the public: “Stop putting things in the town right-of-way — trees, stone walls, fences.”
Rand reported that the site plan for the old railroad station on Ethan Allen Street is finished. The selectmen agreed to refer the site plan to P&Z.
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Vineyards surround single family residences, barns, sheds and a tasting room at Sunset Meadows Vineyards was sold for $2,450,000.
Christine Bates
GOSHEN — Goshen’s real estate market in August was lively in part due to six purchases in Woodridge Lake and two lots in the Meadow Crest subdivision. The largest sale this month was $2,450,000 for three adjacent parcels constituting Sunset Meadows Vineyard while the smallest was $12,000 for a campsite at Hemlock Camp Resort. There’s something for everyone in Goshen with homes selling across a wide range of price points. The current median price for a single-family home in Goshen is $640,000, the highest in twenty years with the upward trend following the general market in Connecticut.
Inventory is being snapped up in Goshen with only 19 properties on the market — only 8 of them are single family homes while 10 vacant building lots are listed.
August Transfers
Hyerdale West Drive, lot 87 in Woodridge Lake — 1.11 acres old by Estate of Raymon Shine to Todd Daniel Bell Jr. and Alexis Stauder Bell for $75,000
434 East Hyerdale Road — 4 bedroom/3 bath house sold by John S. and Katheryn A Bryant to Whitney Anne and Joshua I. Morin for $1,600,000.
533, 563 and 599 Old Middle Road — Vineyard, residences and buildings sold by Nancy R. Wadhams to Grape Life LLC for a total of $2,450,000.
58 East Hyerdale Drive, Woodridge Lake — 4 bedroom/4 bathroom waterfront contemporary house on 1.02 acres sold by Lori F. Alpers to Shelley and David Maffucci for $1,800,000.
55 Jakes Road — 3 bedroom/2 bath home on 1.15 acres sold by Mark Dwyer and Makiko Kawaguchi to Nona Footz and Karsten Beutnagel for $559,000.
5 Lakeshore Drive — A single-family waterfront home on Tyler Lake sold by Thomas Bazzolo to Edward J. Townsend and Erin T. Considine for $150,000.
4 Meadowcrest South — A single family ranch on 1.22 acres sold by Henne Development Company LLC to Edward S. Jr. and Frances L. Caco for $104,000.
14 Ives Road — 4 bedroom/2.5 bath home at Woodridge Lake sold by Martine and Briana Voss to Gary and Kathleen Vitiello for $689,000.
18 Dresden Circle — 3 bedroom/2 bath home at Woodridge Lake sold by Sherrin Nolfi to Isabelle and Thomas Pollock Jr. for $480,000.
153 Torrington Road — 3 bedroom/1 bath home of 759 square feet sold by Jason and Ashley Grusauskas to Felicia Nyame for $272,500.
52 Sandy Beach Road — 4 bedroom/2 bath home on Tyler Lake sold by Laurie B. Martinek, Ceil S. Kelly, Todd A. Benjamin and Gregg W. Benjamin to Jennifer and Daniel Feeney for $1,095,000.
Campsite Unit #89, Hemlock Camp Resort — A camp site sold by Hemlock Hill Camp Resort Coop Association to Kenneth and Lisa Lesinsky for $12,000.
618 Beach Street — 4 bedroom/2 bath home sold by Deutsche Bank Trust Company to Osamah Palwala for $182,700.
*Town of Goshen real estate sales recorded as sold between August 1, 2024, and August 31, 2024, provided by the Goshen Town Clerk. Property details from Goshen tax cards and CT MLS where available. Transfers with no consideration are not included. Compiled by Christine Bates, Real Estate Salesperson with William Pitt Sotheby’s International Realty, Licensed in CT and NY.
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Leaders learn from agritourism success
Oct 16, 2024
Selectmen toured Norbrook Farm Brewery Oct. 10.
Riley Klein
COLEBROOK — Situated in the hills near the border of Norfolk and Colebrook, Norbrook Farm Brewery has become a cultural destination in the Northwest Corner.
For the past six years, Norbrook has attracted many regulars from Litchfield and Berkshire Counties. The home-brewed ales are paired with local eats and activities. A disc golf course and miles of wooded trails are utilized by outdoor recreationists and bring in tourists from all over.
Leaders from across the county gathered in Norbrook’s tap room Oct. 10 to hold the monthly meeting of the Northwest Hill Council of Governments (COG). The selectmen in attendance aimed to learn of Norbrook’s successes, challenges and plans for the future. On this morning, the bar served coffee and tea.
The group heard from owners John and Randy Auclair before receiving a tour of the facility led by Canaan-born brewmaster Colin Coan. The Auclair brothers said the nearly 500-acre property’s varying terrain lends itself perfectly to the multiple uses of the brewery.
John Auclair lived next door to the property that is now Norbrook Farm and was looking for something to occupy his time after selling the Auclairs’ previous business, Electric Motion Company in Winsted. The plot of land became bank-owned and the Auclairs bought it in 2016.
The front portion, near the Stillman Hill Road frontage, houses the brewery. Nearby, about 600 hops plants grow next to a goat pen, and cows graze the field.
Further into the property wooded acreage contains 11 miles of mountain bike trails, eight miles of hiking paths and a disc golf course. Near the back of the property mountainous terrain means “you’ve got to be a billy goat to go up,” as Auclair put it.
Combining full time and part time staff, more than 20 individuals are employed at the brewery, which is on track to produce about 1,500 barrels of beer this year. An on-site distillery is in the works to add spirits to Norbrook’s menu in the coming years. A new kitchen is also being built.
Norbrook has attracted guests from as far as Cologne, Germany, who reported the Kolsch-style “Cog Ale” (no relation to COG) is just as good as the brew back home.
COG Chair Dan Jerram, First Selectman of New Hartford, asked if it was a challenge to open the brewery in a rural location with no public water or sewer. The Auclairs said a second well was drilled to adequately supply water for the operation and the septic field may need to double in size to keep up with growth.
The property is situated near the wind turbines in Colebrook, which provide ample electric service for the needs of the brewery. “Eversource tells me 100% of our power here comes from those turbines,” said John Auclair
Norbrook’s conversion of (mostly) unimproved land into a popular recreation destination is seen as a template for modern agritourism success in the Northwest Corner.
A comparable venture is in the works in Cornwall. Earlier this year Ridgway Farm received Planning and Zoning Commission approval to build a cidery, tasting room and farm store on its Town Street property.
Ian Ridgway said progress on the cidery is coming along. Foundation work is underway and the Ridgways have been busy “planting a lot of apple trees.”
The preliminary timeline eyes a fall 2025 opening for the farm store. Cider will follow, likely in 2026.
Ridgway found Norbrook’s outdoor recreation model intriguing and, though the trail networks aren’t available at Ridgway Farm, orchard and cidery tours will be on the menu.
In researching the history of cider in Cornwall, the Ridgways found a record from the year 1800 that showed the town was producing 1,500 barrels of cider per year (about equal to Norbrook’s beer yield in 2024). The population of the town was roughly the same at about 1,500 people, and all of the cider produced in town stayed in town.
“They had a barrel for every person,” said Ridgway, who is looking forward to continuing Cornwall’s cider legacy.
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