Commission on Conservation & Agriculture

Chairperson Bob Daniels Commission Vice-Chair Members Vacant Michael Thomas Kate Miller on Jane Brawerman Daniel Penney Barbara Schukoske William Gardner Conservation & Evan Peterson Vacant William Harris Agriculture Alternates William Wilson Vacant Vincent Senatore Staff James Sipperly, Environmental Planner REGULAR MEETING Corinne Milardo, Administrative Assistant Minutes DATE: Tuesday, March 18, 2025 TIME: 7:00 p.m. Meeting was held in person in Room 208, Municipal Building and via WebEx. In person attendance: Commissioners: Bob Daniels, Kate Miller, Barbara Schukoske, Evan Peterson, William Harris, Vincent Senatore Jane Brawerman (Arrived at 7:22pm) Public: None. WebEx Attendance: Commissioners: William Gardner. Public: None. Absent: Commissioners: Michael Thomas, Daniel Penney, William Wilson. Staff in Attendance: James Sipperly, Environmental Planner Corinne Milardo, Administrative Assistant A. Call to Order Chairperson B. Daniels called the meeting to order at 7:04 pm. 1. Election of Officers i. Vice Chair B. Daniels stated that they will table the election of the Vice Chair until the next meeting. B. Accept the Agenda Motion to accept the agenda. Moved by B. Schukoske, seconded by V. Senatore. Passed unanimously: 6-0. C. Public Forum None. D. Approval of Minutes 1. January 21, 2025 If you require special accommodations for any meeting, please call the ADA Coordinator at (860) 638-4540, (voice) or (860) 638-4812 (TDD/TTY), or the Town Clerk’s Office at (860) 638-4910 at least ten (10) days prior to the scheduled meeting. Page 1 of 7 B Daniels noticed that Jeff Hasbrouck’s last name was misspelled in a couple of places in the minutes and requested that corrections be made. Motion to approve the minutes as amended. Moved by B. Schukoske, seconded by W. Gardner. Passed: 6-0. E. Request for Comment J. Sipperly reported that Wesleyan University currently has an application that is before the Inland Wetlands and Watercourses Agency. Wesleyan University is proposing to fill in an existing pond with contaminated soil they found in spots throughout their campus. J. Sipperly explained that Connecticut doesn’t allow for the disposal of contaminated soil. The soil would have to get shipped to Massachusetts which will cost millions of dollars. Wesleyan University came up with an alternative plan to drain the pond that’s between Wadsworth Street and Pine Street, take the contaminated soil and put it in the pond, create a stream that will pass through and cover it with good soil. The public hearing for this application has been continued to the April 2nd meeting. J. Sipperly encourages those on the Conservation Commission to attend the meeting. K. Miller asked if this plan was previously approved by the State. J. Sipperly answered yes. K. Miller then asked that if someone had a problem with the remediation plan, what agency would address the problem. J. Sipperly answered the State K. Miller then asked why the State approved a plan without a liner. J. Sipperly answered that the Wetlands Agency asked that same question and it will be addressed during the April meeting. B. Daniels commented that the stream running through there is a little strange. J. Sipperly and K, Miller both stated that the stream will be diverted and elevated. K. Miller expressed her concerns in regards to the clean soil that will be used. She stated that the top foot or so of soil is filled with invasive species seeds. J. Sipperly stated that the environmental person will be at the next Wetlands meeting to address that. B. Daniels asked if the Inland Wetlands Agency can stop this project. J. Sipperly answered yes they can. F. Officers and Committee Reports 1. Chair’s Report J. Brawerman arrived at 7:22pm. Page 2 of 7 B. Daniels reported that J. Brawerman provided the commission with the Connecticut Weekly Ag Report. B. Daniels informed the commission that VoAg wants to purchase a chicken tractor, a movable chicken coup. Can we use our grant money for this purchase? J. Sipperly answered we could probably make that happen. i. Open Space Acquisition Fund Balance J. Sipperly reported there have been no changes. 2. Agriculture Committee i. Agriculture Support for Farmers B. Daniels referenced the Resources on Farming document that E. Peterson put together. This document will be uploaded to the website for the public to access. J. Brawerman recommended some additions that E. Peterson will incorporate into the document. 3. Outreach Committee i. Conservation Corner Update B. Daniels will reach out to Brian Gartner to inquire about the articles he was working on before he resigned. 4. Open Space Management Committee i. Wilcox Management invasive species study J. Sipperly informed the commission that he attended the annual meeting of the Connecticut Association of Wetlands Scientists. J. Sipperly met a company that specializes in invasive species management called BSC Group. BSC Group was just hired by Stamford to do a complete invasive species management plan on their open space properties. J. Sipperly mentioned the proposal they are working on for Wilcox. J. Sipperly will have the proposal go out for bid but he will also send the proposal to the BSC Group. The BSC Group can identify specific invasive species or an overall identification of invasive species. K. Miller asked if we should give the intended company a list of invasive species or have them focus on a specific area. J. Sipperly answered that he would ask them how they would approach it. The BSC Group recommended that the best time of year to do this study would be late spring, early summer just to do the inventory. ii. Open Space Priorities J. Sipperly stated that we have money for maintaining open space. We need to identify what open spaces are a priority. Wilcox will be a priority for invasive species, tree removal and trail maintenance. Guida’s is another priority. A sign needs to be replaced and it needs trail maintenance. Page 3 of 7 J. Sipperly informed the commission that a parcel of open space off of Stantack Road that is owned by the City of Middletown, has a cabin on the property that someone built. They don’t know who constructed the cabin but they left a notice on the cabin door asking that the person contact the City. iii. Trail Maintenance Needed – CFPA Wilcox Open Space Wilcox open space trails will be a priority for maintenance. K. Miller asked if we have any new properties that don’t have trails on them. J. Brawerman suggested the Wilson property off of South Main Street. J. Sipperly said that if we were to put a trail on the Wilson property, it wouldn’t connect to anything. The cost to clear that area and maintain it would be astronomical. K. Miller said there is no public access to the Merriam property. J. Sipperly believes there are deed restrictions regarding public access. K. Miller requested that the Merriam property be added to the next agenda. K. Miller would like to know if we’re supposed to have public access to that property. J. Sipperly said he will look into it. 5. Open Space Acquisition Committee i. 470 Chamberlain Road J. Sipperly reported that the owner is ready to sell. An appraisal of the property still needs to be done first. K. Miller suggested sending the Land Trust a copy of the Conservation Commission agenda each month to keep them informed of properties we are interested in. ii. Country Club Road site J. Sipperly reported that the owner of the property still wants to sell but they want to offer the lot to family first. K. Miller stated that the commission hasn’t had an executive session for sensitive property acquisitions. J. Sipperly responded that there’s been no need for an executive session since all the potential property acquisitions are open for discussion. There are instances when a property owner wants to sell confidentially so that relatives or a real estate agent doesn’t find out. iii. Stantack Road J. Sipperly explained that there is an eighteen acre lot on Stantack Road that the owner wanted to develop. The owner was informed that he would have to do a substantive amount of improvements to Stantack Road in order to get access to his property. Those improvements will cost an astronomical amount of money. There is no water or sewer available in the area, so the landowner decided to sell. Page 4 of 7  iv. 159 Boston Road J. Sipperly explained that this property is literally falling apart. The owner is finally out of an unsafe house. One of the properties is the old airplane field from behind CT Beverage Mart all the way to Boston Road. This property has become too much for the owner and now wants to sell his property to the City. K. Miller said there are three parcels equaling about twenty acres. K. Miller suggested that a special meeting can be called when there is a time constraint on a property purchase. G. Old Business i. Trail Guide updating and reprinting and contract – working with Gary Middleton J. Sipperly reported that G. Middleton has completed mapping the trails and is now working on the descriptions. G. Middleton would like to know in the existing trail guide, if there are trails that anybody knows of that no longer exist and you want them removed. K. Miller stated that she has created a document and kept it updated throughout the years that lists some of the properties that are defunct. J. Sipperly asked K. Miller to send that list to G. Middleton. J. Sipperly would like the same person who printed the last trail guide work on this trail guide since she is familiar with the project. ii. Ravine Park J. Sipperly said that there are trails in Ravine Park that are hazardous that people shouldn’t use. We can’t use open space money for Ravine Park. Since the City is now without a Public Works Director and Deputy Director, the condition of the park will further deteriorate. J. Brawerman asked if Ravine Park can be redesignated as open space. J. Sipperly answered no, it’s in the deed. J. Brawerman commented that Ravine Park should be taken off the agenda since it’s a waste of time to discuss. K. Miller asked if we can use the twenty five thousand dollars in the Land Use budget to maintain Ravine Park. She would like to see the money used for the initial environmental assessment. J. Sipperly answered that Director Kozikowski isn’t going to give Public Works part of his fiscal year budget. J. Brawerman asked if it would be worth meeting with the mayor about the issues with Ravine Park. J. Sipperly asked B. Daniels to write an email to Director Kozikowski that we would like to set up a meeting with the mayor to discuss Ravine Park maintenance and improvements. W. Harris commented that the issue with Ravine Park is the path goes close to the brook and the stream is eroding the trail. W. Harris asked what the problem is in going around. Page 5 of 7 J. Brawerman said there’s a lot of wetlands so the trail would have to be rerouted which there is no problem with that but it requires resources. J. Sipperly added that Public Works has been out there several times trying to band-aid the trail with more stone but it washes out and it’s now in the brook. iii. Right to Farm Signs - Installation J. Sipperly reported that there are twelve signs up in the City. The only sign that needs to be relocated is on Ridge Road. They’re looking at the island at the intersection of Ridge Road and Russell Street. B. Daniels and B. Schukoske have signs displayed at their farms. They have eight signs left that maybe other farmers would like to have. J. Sipperly did have some phone calls asking about the signs. iv. Red Maple Swamp Update J. Sipperly reported that they met with Mark Reynolds, the engineer. Mark Reynolds’ son is the surveyor. They started putting in the traverse along the road starting at Mile Lane. They found a couple of pins at our property’s boundaries. They’re going to come off those pins and put a traverse up on the edge of Kaplan Drive, through the parking lot, into the field. From the field they’ll go over to the edge where those proposed apartments were. They will survey in the points on the maps that we provided them. Once they put together an A-2 survey, we’ll present it to the Conservation Commission then we’ll present it to the Common Council for permanent protection. It includes the parcel that David Winkel always talks about. The reason they’re doing this is to carve out Lawrence School. v. CCA 2024 Annual Report K. Miller asked if they have a chance to add to it. B. Daniels told the commission if you want to add to the report, they certainly can. J. Sipperly suggested that the commission come in with comments for the next meeting. We’ll discuss it and put everything into a final document. J. Brawerman suggested providing more context in the report and photographs of events that happened. H. New Business i. Resources for New Farmers J. Sipperly said this ties into educating new farmers. We’ll have the list online with agencies, contacts, and phone numbers to assist them on their journey to become a farmer. The current document is a great start but we’ll add to it. J. Brawerman suggested having something that talks about Middletown’s farming history. B. Daniels said that this document will be constantly updated. ii. New State Park Proposed Near CVH Reservoirs, Representative Brandon Chaffee Brandon Chaffee, State Rep., came up with the idea to use the CVH Reservoirs to create a State Park. There’s nothing formal right now. Page 6 of 7 J. Brawerman said that State Parks are so severely under-resourced. If we have another State Park that requires upkeep and maintenance and there’s not enough resources to maintain the existing State Parks. K. Miller said that she would rather see properties preserved than not preserved. K. Miller would like to know how this would protect the land versus its current status. J. Brawerman wonder if the US Fish and Wildlife Service would be interested in acquiring the land as part of their Maromas area. K. Miller asked about the Land Trust. iii. Lamentation Mountain Plan J. Sipperly reported that Director Kozikowski, the Town of Berlin, the Town of Meriden and a bunch of town planners will get together to come up the Lamentation Mountain Plan with funding that became available. J. Sipperly will provide more details when he hears more updates. What sparked this plan was the fires. I. Member Forum J. Brawerman shared that the Conservation District is having its annual native plant sale. There is a web store that she encourages everyone to visit. The deadline for ordering is April 6th. K. Miller talked about the commission’s membership that doesn’t accurately reflect the diversity of the City. She suggests to create a public service announcement that can be sent out to organizations and newspapers. K. Miller drafted a couple of paragraphs and sent it in an email to the commission. She also included information on the trail guide as well as new farming info. K. Miller asked for comments and suggestions for changes if needed. K. Miller also brought up that the website has outdated information on the commission and missing information. She would like to suggest additions and changes that she will include in the email. K. Miller would like to add this to the agenda for next month for discussion. J. Sipperly said that we have one regular member vacancy and one alternate vacancy. J. Adjournment Motion to adjourn the meeting at 8:59 pm. Moved by B. Schukoske, seconded by V. Senatore. Passed unanimously: 6-0. Page 7 of 7