June 26, 2006

Kelo New London Update: Barriers to a Finalized Deal Remain

Filed under: Economy, Taxes & Government — TBlumer @ 9:06 am

UPDATE, June 30: It’s Over

See below for links to all previous posts.
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There still are some barriers to a final deal between the City of New London and the two remaining Fort Trumbull holdouts (Susette Kelo and the Cristofaro family), and the saga is not totally over, despite the misleading headline at CBS News.

The June 24 story from AP lays out the uncertainty in the minds of the holdouts:

Later Friday, Kelo disputed the characterization of the deal and said: “There’s talks. That’s it.”

The five other property owners in the case had already settled with the city and handed over their properties. The city’s development arm, the New London Development Corp., first condemned the properties in 2000.

Michael Cristofaro, Pasquale’s son, praised Rell and the Department of Economic and Community Development for trying to find a fair solution. However, he said he’s still not sure about the outcome.

“There’s a lot of details in the negotiations that we haven’t totally agreed on and we’re working on those,” he said. “When Susette and I make our statements next week, I think everyone will be pleased with the results that the state has come up with.”

Cristofaro acknowledged the tentative agreement could still fall through.

The New London Day’s June 24 story (registration required after one day; paid subscription required after seven days) tells us more:

….. The weeks of discussions have involved financial incentives and the possibility of moving the houses taken by eminent domain, but one of Cristofaro’s sons, Michael Cristofaro, said Friday that moving his father’s longtime house out of Fort Trumbull had been ruled out.

“It’s too costly, too big, and there are too many power lines,” he said. “I don’t want to go through that.”

Rell and Mayor Beth A. Sabilia have both proposed relocating the houses in recent months, but the plans failed over disagreements over who would own the homes. Sabilia declined to comment Friday on whether negotiations still involved moving Kelo’s home.

….. But Michael Cristofaro said there’s a 90 percent possibility of coming to a conclusion by next Friday.

“I still feel my family will still be able to stay in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood,” he said.

Kelo, meanwhile, said she had no details to share.

“I would if I had some, but I have none,” she said. “Call me back Friday.”

….. The tentative agreement “takes into account the homeowners’ attachment to their homes in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood,” Bullock said, but he would not elaborate, citing the sensitive nature of the negotiations.

“If anything is going to cause a breakdown in negotiations, it’s giving a play-by-play of the details,” he said.

Though moving either house looks like a daunting task to me, a look at the relative sizes of the two homes shows you why Kelo’s (on the left) would appear to be the easier to move of the two:

Kelo House Cristafaro

There would appear to be other logistical barriers to a final settlement that have to do with the developer’s current plans:

Sabilia said only that no single-family residences are allowed on the parcel known as 4A, where one proposal would have relocated the plaintiffs’ homes, under the Municipal Development Plan for Fort Trumbull.

The state Department of Environmental Protection reiterated this week in a letter to the city’s Planning and Zoning Commission that, under coastal management regulations, the absolute limit of residential housing units on the Fort Trumbull peninsula is 80.

Developer Corcoran Jennison has an application pending to build 66 apartments and 14 townhouses in Fort Trumbull.

Mike Cristofaro didn’t leave too much doubt as to where they stands on how well different parties have treated him:

Michael Cristofaro said he was grateful to the state for “starting to treat property owners with fairness and respect.”

“Our door’s always been open to fair negotiations,” he said.

Finally, in a separate New London Day article on Saturday, one of those who settled in the week leading up to City Council’s June 5 eviction vote was very vocal about who deserves credit for getting things to this point:

William Von Winkle seemed to sum up the feelings of many of them.

“It’s over. It’s just over,” he said. “How much more can you print?”

Von Winkle did express appreciation for Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s 11th-hour involvement in the negotiations between the plaintiffs and the city.

“Rell for governor,” he said. “She’s the best. I’ve got to say that. She made something that couldn’t happen for eight years happen.”

We’ll most likely have to wait until the end of the week to see if the two holdouts got what I consider their bottom-line demands met: staying in their homes, the homes remain in Fort Trumbull, and they receive the immediate-family-transfer titles the Governor Rell advocated.
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