New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Neighbors appeal court decision allowing cell tower
WOODBRIDGE — A group of neighbors are taking their grievances against the installation of a Verizon cell tower on Newton Road to appellate court.
The Woodbridge Newton Neighborhood Environmental Trust, a voluntary association whose members own residential property in a scenic neighborhood along Newton Road and Soundview Drive, has appealed a Superior Court judge’s decision to uphold the Connecticut Siting Council’s approval of an application to install a Verizon cell tower on a 6.01-acre parcel at 118 Newton Road.
One Soundview Drive resident whose home is adjacent to the site of the cell tower has also filed a separate appeal on her own behalf, begging the appeals court to stop construction of the structure.
“We have to appeal, because we will lose our family house and will be financially destroyed,” Kiyoko Karwowski stated in her appeal. “In our residential community, nobody would live next to a cell tower and we are going to force evacuating from our house. Please help.”
Karwowski said over the phone Thursday that the cell tower would cause her home’s property value to plummet and make it more difficult to sell in the future.
“It will ruin everything,” she said.
A decision from the appeals court is expected to take at least a year or more,
officials said. According to Town Attorney Gerald Weiner, the Board of Selectmen has indicated that it wouldn’t authorize hiring an attorney to further represent the WNNET during its appeal. The town had previously hired an attorney to represent the group during the Siting Council’s application process for the cell tower.
“It’s just a waiting game to see what happens in the appellate court,” Weiner said during the Board of Selectmen’s Jan. 11 meeting.
The association — described in court documents as being “concerned for the orderly development and environmental integrity of Woodbridge” — has argued that the cell tower would spoil their scenic views and lower property values.
After the Siting Council, which has authority over the placement of telecommunications facilities in the state, voted 4-2 to approve the cell tower application in December 2021, the group appealed that decision in Superior Court, asserting in court documents that the council had refused to consider how the tower would affect private property values in the surrounding area.