Finance OKs Old Mill Pond project, in part using housing funds

By Gretchen Webster

WESTPORT — A $5.58 million appropriation to fix the Old Mill Pond Department walkway and tidal gate at Old Mill Pond has been unanimously approved by the Board of Finance.

The project, designed to improve the flow in and out of the tidal estuary, would replace the 30-year-old tidal structure.

The work will be partly financed with an allocation of federal American Rescue Plan Act funds, some of which were initially slated for a feasibility study for an affordable housing project on state Department of Transportation property at West Parish Road and Post Road East. 

But since ARPA funds allocated to Westport will expire Dec. 31 if unused, and can’t be used by the town for the $150,000 housing study without a contract in place by then, “we are switching this so we don’t lose the funds,” Finance Director Gary Conrad told the board Wednesday.

“If anything is not committed, it just falls off and goes back to the [state] treasury,” Conrad said.

The feasibility study for an affordable housing project of 20 to 30 units was approved by the Representative Town Meeting in February 2022 as part of the $8.4 million in ARPA funds allocated for Westport. 

The study, however, has not been done.

“The state hasn’t come through with their side of it — without a contract there’s nothing we can do,” Conrad said Monday.

The study was to look into whether housing could be built on part of the property where the DOT has a maintenance facility. The site earmarked for Westport’s affordable housing is still labeled for the town’s potential use on state maps, according to Matthew Easdon, a state project engineer.

Terry Obey, director of rights of way for the DOT, said the agency is moving forward with its own maintenance project on the land, but is holding space for Westport “in anticipation that the affordable housing will eventually be built” on the edge of the state property. “But there hasn’t been activity on this for years,” he said last week.

For the affordable housing feasibility study to go forward now, the town would need to either use money from its own property fund, list it on the capital spending forecast or bond it, Conrad told the Board of Finance.

The town’s tidal gate project, on the other hand, is ready to go with bids in and contracts ready to be signed, Public Works Director Peter Ratkiewich told the board Wednesday. The ARPA money for the affordable housing project and other uncommitted ARPA funds can therefore be used for the tidal gate project.

“We have the permits, it’s shovel ready,” he said of the plans to rebuild the Old Mill walkway and tide gate structure.  “It’s pretty urgent.” 

The town is also looking for grants to offset the cost,” he told board members. 

Freelance writer Gretchen Webster, a Fairfield County journalist for many years, was editor of the Fairfield Minuteman and has taught journalism at New York and Southern Connecticut State universities.