Church may sell site for retired clergy
Neighbors urge open space, officials consider affordable housing
FAIRFIELD — For decades, retired Episcopal clergy have lived on about eight acres in a relatively secluded part of Southport.
But now that the church no longer needs the property on Mill Hill Terrace, officials are considering selling the land — appraised at $3.2 million, according to town land use records — for a possible affordable housing project.
Neighbors argue it should become open space and submitted a proposal of their own, which the church is also considering.
“We’re trying to do our part to listen to all of those parties,” said Bishop Ian Douglas, with the Episcopal Church in Connecticut.
Parishioner Elizabeth Berg left the land to the church when she died in the 1960s to be used as a place for the retired clergy to live and they did, until a few years ago, when the last member moved to a retirement home. A large house, two smaller houses, a garage and utility building sit on the site.
The church still supports retired clergy, including covering the costs of retirement homes, Douglas said, and the sale of the property will be used to help cover the costs.
Finances are one of four factors the Missionary Society of the Episcopal Church of Connecticut is considering when determining which proposal to go with, he said, along with increasing Connecticut’s affordable housing
stock, preserving open space and seeing what the impact the sale would have on the local church’s ability to continue their work in the area.
The Missionary Society is an elected board of 30 members from Episcopal churches throughout the state made up of both clergy and lay members. It represents about 155 parishes and roughly 55,000 Episcopalians, including those in Fairfield. It oversees the diocese’s assets, including endowments and real estate, Douglas said.
The Society decided to put the Mill Hill Terrace property on the market in December 2019.
“We’ve had a host of proposals both pre-COVID and during COVID that we’re considering,” Douglas said.
The society next meets the second week of June.
Of the eight proposals the board is looking at now, six seem to include the four main criteria to various degrees, he said.
Some proposals emphasize one element and minimize another, especially when looking at affordable housing and open space, he said.
“No one group is going to get everything they want,” he said, adding none of the affordable housing proposals exceed 100 units.
Some of the proposals come from residents who argue an affordable housing project wouldn’t fit in their neighborhood.
“The location is unique in that it is relatively large and undeveloped and sits in the middle of a purely residential neighborhood — with no Main Street or transportation access,” said Bruce Audino, one of the residents.
He said a survey sent out to neighbors to gauge interest in keeping the land open space, which would require a fundraising effort to offer market value, showed there was support for that effort.
“Based on the universal concern around the fate of this property, private citizens in this community have come to the table to offer a variety of alternative proposals that would limit the impact a large development might have,” Audino said.
“This has included single family homes to open space. Clearly open space has the least impact and largest community and environmental benefit, but is the most challenging to finance and compete against a large development,” he said.
Residents said they worry an apartment complex could burden the schools, make the area unsafe and increase traffic, light and noise. There’s already an elementary school and two health care facilities nearby with the town’s alternative high school program set to relocate to the former Giant Steps property.
“Mill Hill Terrace is a small residential road; it is steep, narrow and windy with very few sidewalks,” residents wrote in a letter to the Missionary Society. “Official police records report indicates over 100 traffic accidents on this stretch of Mill Hill Terrace alone.”
They, and others who submitted letters, said they understood and supported the need for more affordable housing but this wasn’t the spot to do it.
“There is a real need for green space in this part of Fairfield and it opens up opportunities for educational programs and community gardens, just to name a few,” they wrote. “Open space offers intangible value far greater than any profit; it preserves land and protects natural resources in an era that is fraught with overdevelopment.”
Alexis Harrison, copresident of FairPLAN, a group that supports open spaces, natural resources and the character of Fairfield’s neighborhoods, said
the property is a beautiful green space that should be preserved.
“It’s part of the Mill River watershed; it’s part of the natural bounty of our town,” she said, adding it’s been offering a lot of natural benefits for years, such as providing natural flood control, habitat and is migratory stop over.
While she said she would like it to remain open space, she offered some compromises if it had to be developed.
“If the diocese is committed to affordable housing
being built on this parcel, we ask them to ensure that a large portion be preserved for open space and any development not be high rise apartment but perhaps cottage style development, commensurate with this bucolic area of town,” Harrison said. “There has to be a way for all stakeholders to come together to preserve the natural bounty of our town so it’s not destroyed parcel by parcel.”
Several elected leaders have also sent statements to the Missionary Society
arguing against an apartment building there.
Douglas said the church is continuing to meet and correspond with residents and elected officials. He said the people making the decision are trying to do what’s right for everyone involved from both the local and statewide perspective.
“We’re not just coming in and selling it to the highest bidder,” Douglas said. “If that was true, we would have done that a year ago.”