Arguments in that legal sorta way, are winding down or up depending on your point of view over the fate of 93 East Ave, alternatively known as the Grumman-St. John House, or the house that’s falling apart on East Ave. The last three days offers insight into the court procedings. I’ll summarize.
Handrinos: I want to tear it down.
State of Connecticut: You are in technical violations of laws governing historic properties.
Handrinos: I don’t care.
Expert Witness For The Prosecution: Human hands destroyed the property and you failed to fix it back up.
Handrinos: I don’t care, maybe you did the vandalism, I want to tear it down.
Expert Witness For The Defense: Did anyone actually see anyone vandalize the property? Maybe ghosts did it.
Actual Quote By Handrinos: “You accused me of doing something that is not true, maybe you did that.”
State of Connecticut: You have to be kidding me.
In delightful irony, the cover of Preservation Magazine, 
a companion publication to Demolition Magazine, features: Historic Hotels: 3 Amazing Comebacks. Demolition magazine is featuring on its cover, recycling.
In many ways, legal arguments follow the natural form of arguments between parents and teens. I’ve think we’ve all been there at one point or another, on one end of another. I’ll summarize.
Parent: Take Out the garbage.
Teen: Okay.
next day …
Parent: What did you do today?
Teen: Nothing.
Parent: Did you take out the garbage?
Teen: shrugs.
Parent: If you don’t take out the garbage then I’m going to take away your allowance.
Teen: I don’t care. Stop bugging me.
Parent: You live in my house.
Teen: Later.
These arguments between parents and teens can go on, or escalate, and sometimes even get resolved. Just like the legal equivalents, that just formalize the process a bit with fines and court orders, that bear about as much weight as losing that allowance. You see if you’re a teen, you have all the time in the world to figure out how not to take out the garbage.
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Westport has the same issues but does quite a bit better at protecting its historic buildings. Remember the Abel Bradley house? Preservationists took that to court and won against the developers who had purchased to tear down. And, unlike 93 East Avenue, the Wesport house was NOT on the National Register at purchase. It was placed on the register later.
http://www.westportnow.com/archives/011028.htm
Preservationists should learn from this and buy whatever properties they want to preserve.
Who owns the Abel Bradley house in Westport? I don’t think preservationists purchased the property; they simply saved it and (I believe) found a more preservation minded buyer after they had won the case for preservation in court.
Guess my point would be that preservationists should spend their own money buying and preserving homes that they want saved rather than trying to limit what others can do with property that they own.
So, I guess you’re saying no laws to preserve or conserve open space either. If you’re rich, you can preserve and have nice towns…if not, well, too bad. Let the rich folks do what they want with your town. Tear it all down so they can get even richer. I see…
Conservation of public property is a time honored tradition. So is donating to private trusts which purchase and preserve private properties. Philanthropists also purchase private properties, restore them, and donate them to public trusts. Trying to force private property owners to preserve and restore property they purchased with their own money is a an abuse of individual property rights.
How about conservation laws? Those also limit what a person can do on his property. Is that an abuse of individual property rights? The law that pertains to 93 East Avenue is a part of conservation law and thus, it seems to me, has the same basis and weight.
Some conservation laws are good, some are bad.
Conservation laws are in place and any buyer knows which ones affect a property before he buys, if he does his homework. Hendrinos’ situation is a little different. Possibly, the right lawyer could have made him aware of the risks before he bought 93 East. I doubt if anybody would have predicted the problems he has encountered.
He is smart to just let nature take its course and let the house decay. He found a loophole. Good for him.
The Inn’s attorney (Genuario) spoke to the imapct at the original zoning hearing in 2002. The law has been on the books since the 70s; the house has been on the National Regsiter since the 80s. Handrinos must have thought he could get around it because of his connections and Norwalk’s long history of not giving a damn about teardowns. And he may well be right. Witness the folks on the blog willing to see the destruction as “natural”. How come, then, NO other abondoned building in the city (not one! Even those in worse condition to start with!) has deteriroated as much as this one — a building that was quite sound (with damn little maintenance) for many years before it become a “problem” for the Norwalk Inn.
Can the city do a referendum on whether to reissue demolition permit? I have to think most in the city would either not care or prefer to see it torn down at this point. Leave it to the will of the majority.
Westport preservationists went to court to (successfully) save the Abel Bradley house from demoltion. The result? A multi-milion dollar assett to the town. Norwalk Inn is sooooo dumb….
http://www.wpsir.com/detail_print.aspx?mlsid=98372919
I don’t understand why preservationists who care so much about what other people do with their properties don’t just buy them and preserve them however they want. Stop telling other people what to do with their own properties and put their money where their mouth is.
I don’t understand why developers (re: Seligson), feel it’s OK to ask the city, the State and the Feds for money to build a private development. If Seligson needs money to build, let him get it from private donations (like the preservationists do when working to preserve).
But Seligson has done so much for our city he is the one that is going to save us and our kids from the perils of blight,crime and homeless.Lets not forget in order for Norwalk to continue its trek to the top we are going to need Mayor Dick Moccia to hold the reins and bring the money home for the visiting team.
Has Mr Brown filed for a demolition permit for his block of rundown buildings on Chestnut and Henry st yet so our state of the art train station can be built? Now that is going to be a sweet deal for him.He was very vocal the last meeting they had supporting we spend millions on another parking garage for the train station.Wonder if he knows Seligson.
I agree. Investors should not be given use of public funds for their projects.
Another who also agrees,he should not be given a dime.
The lady who led the group that fought the demolition of the Abel Bradley house, Eleanor Dickey, moved to England before the project was finished. The builder/owner offered to give the preservationists the house and $10,000 tiward the cost of moving it, and they wouldn’t take it. He eventually completely restored the building, at great expense, and made it a part of a large home he built on the property. As far as I could find, there was an injunction to prevent demolition, but the final deal that saved the house was not the result of a court decision, but a compromise between the builder and the preservationists that cost the builder a lot of money. The preservationists, in this case, were able to get the building “under consideration” for listing in the federal register and that brought it under the protection of the same law being used in the 93 East Ave case, that allows anybody to file suit to prevent demolition. Mrs Dickey filed suit under the name of a coalition to save the house and the delay that promised caused the builder to work out the eventual compromise and get the suit withdrawn.
#65 – I may be wrong, but wasn’t Seligson approached to store the Incerto house pieces, and did he not do so free of charge for a period of time? Not that this justifies money for private development (a different argument), but it is a demonstration of the point that the preservationists obtained a “private donation” from HIM to keep that Flying Dutchman from ending up at the Transfer Station. Give him at least a little bit of credit for that.
The logic behind developers like Seligson asking for money from the City, State, or Federal government on a major redevelopment project is simple. The developer is taking considerable risk with his own money to build/develop in a manner that will bring long term benefit to the City, State, and Federal Govt. in much higher tax revenue. A really good project will cause enormous benefits, both direct and indirect. One successful office building will be copied by others, one successful retail store will be copied, etc.. The developers feel it is reasonable for the government entities that will benefit for years to share in some of the initial risk/expense. A property with an old multi family house doesn’t pay anywhere near the tax a big commercial building pays, nor generate the jobs. You can be sure the projected tax revenue from a Seligson project far outweighs the tax money he is looking for.
For that matter, the tax the city will collect from an addition to the hotel will be many times what they get from 93 East Ave, and the hotel isn’t even asking for any money from the City.
Most builder/developers don’t ask for tax money to finance small low-risk projects and, in fact,sometimes spend their money installing infrastructure for the City, like sewers, storm drains, roads, etc.
Except the preservationist experts were wrong amd the house was not as it was purported to be so it was a big waste of money. Where are all these preservationists now. Why don’t they donate enough money to buy land abd rebuild the Incerto house? Or do they want it rebuilt with other people’s money?
The City would collect even more tax revenues if the Inn were to adopt one of the preservation-presented alternatives to expand the Inn and sold 93 East Avenue to be rehabbed as apartments or office space. That would be a win-win…but I guess Handrinos is just not that into compromise.
Nor should he have to. I am sure that if it were more profitable for him to do so, that is what he would have done. I have seen the drawings and it looks to be a very nice expansion. It seems a lot nicer than the old DMV building and the several brick office buildnins that are actually much closer to the green than 93 is.
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