Owning the Decision and Everything that Follows

Tuesday night as part of its meeting agenda, the men and women of the Norwich City Council will, in some shape, size or form, decide on an offer by the State of Connecticut to purchase that portion of the former Norwich State Hospital property within the city limits for a dollar. Let me hasten to add there are a number of conditions to the sale including an assumption by the residents of Norwich of both the responsibility and costs of environmental remediation of the entire parcel.

The advisory panel, assembled by the previous City Council, after months of research and conversations with subject matter experts ranging from historians through hazardous material disposal specialists reported estimated remediation costs in seven figures for a property that so far has yet to have a purpose or function articulated for it.

The question before all of us, but most especially the seven people at the front of the room Tuesday is two sided: Can we afford to buy this property? Can we afford NOT to buy it? Now might be a good time to take out a blank sheet of paper, number as much as you'd like and do not copy from your neighbor as you compile your own list of reasons for how you would decide.

But speaking of lists, at a Saturday session a month ago, the Council and City Manager agreed on a ranking of challenges and opportunities facing our city. Their Top Six included (in order): a need to promote Norwich; the lack of an economic development plan; an inability to establish and attain realistic goals; location, history and citizenship; emergency services and a lack of manufacturing jobs and proliferation of service jobs.

In the Saturdays that have followed, progress has been made on sorting out the responsibilities involved in creating, articulating, staffing and managing the various aspects of a cogent and coherent action plan to enhance economic development (and the revenue streams that such development provides) across Norwich.

They'll all meet again this Saturday morning at eight in Room 335 of City Hall with the advisory boards and organizations involved so far in answering questions and concerns about demographic and economic aspects to better develop a snapshot of where Norwich (is) Now before choosing a path and pace towards which we can head.

There will be a second meeting on Saturday, at 1230, also in Room 335, with State Senator Edith Prague and representatives of the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection, to share with the members of the City Council as an informational workshop (I imagine much of) the information the Norwich Hospital Site Advisory has already gathered, developed and shared with the Council. There will be an 'opportunity for citizen comment' and if you've been procrastinating about making yourself heard, Saturday afternoon might be a time to rethink that position.

All of those Saturday discussions will be part of the perspective each of the alderpersons will use Tuesday evening, I hope, to decide despite the compelling reasons so many residents have shared during the public hearings, that Norwich should NOT purchase the former Hospital site property. Not necessarily part of the discussion Tuesday, but helping frame it, I'm sure, is Connecticut General Statute, 8-24, on the requirements for a two-third majority vote by a city council for any purchase receiving an unfavorable recommendation by its commission on the city plan (thank you ML for the citation). Meaning five yes votes, and not a simple majority of the Council, will be required.

It's not just the multi-millions in clean-up costs that disquiets me (though it certainly doesn't reassure me) or that those dollars are so urgently needed for other projects across and throughout the city., It's the total absence of any plan for what to do with the land (of which slightly less than half of its sort-of seventy acres reportedly can be developed). We're learning to plan our work and then to work our plan. We're not there yet, but we're getting there. When we do, it's not likely this opportunity will have vanished and the next time, we'll be ready, willing and finally able.
-bill kenny