Ridgefield Candidates '97
Planning and Zoning Commission

Nelson Gelfman

Nelson Gelfman is a quiet man, a person of erudition and accomplishment, one not given to boasting of his remarkable career. As one of the two Democratic contenders for the Planning and Zoning Commission, this gentle doctor wants to continue to serve the town he loves, as he has done for more than 30 years.

Dr. Gelfman moved to Ridgefield from New Haven in 1964, so while he will never be a "native" he certainly has earned the sobriquet of "long-time resident." In those 33 years he has watched the town grow from a sleepy farming town barely touched by the 20th century into a thriving community of global tastes.

Dr. Gelfman earned his B.S. at Rutgers during the Korean War years, and received his M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania as the Cold War was turning frigid during the Eisenhower administration. He served as a "flying doctor" in the U.S. Air Force during those risky years of pioneering jet aircraft and the beginning of space flight. Eventually leaving the military, he moved to Yale for advanced training and developed his specialty in pathology. Eventually Dr. Gelfman served as the Medical Director of the Renal Dialysis Center at Danbury Hospital. Currently he is semi-retired from this demanding medical career.

In Ridgefield, he served on the building committes for not just one but three of our best elementary schools, the Scotland and Branchville schools and the Barlow Mountain facility, which is now a Parks and Rec center. He served on the vital Conservation Commission for five years and in 1967 was elected to Planning and Zoning where he has remained for thirty years. Currently he serves as Chairman of that crucial process.

Dr. Gelfman feels the greatest challenge facing Ridgefield today is to "continue our community's careful balance of development in the face of decreasing land availability." As the Town becomes more desirable and land becomes more scare, the remaining land becomes more valuable. Many land owners and outside developers are eager to make fast money building anything they can sell. This runs the risk, Dr. Gelfman notes, of "destroying the very beauty that originally made the property so valuable." While Dr. Gelfman would never take the credit, it's clear that today's charming Ridgefield is in no small part due to his thirty years of careful and thoughtful zoning.

In identifying his priorities, Dr. Gelfman enumerated five critical issues and carefully ranked them in importance:

• To preserve the beauty and character of Ridgefield, including minimizing the dislocation caused by the unavoidable growth in the community;
  
  
• To protect the remaining biodiversity as found in the rivers, fields, forests and wetlands of this rugged and beautiful corner of Connecticut;
  
  
• To protect economic stability within the town, keeping the small businesses healthy and property taxes affordable without the pollution from factories or the congestion of strip malls;
  
  
• To protect the housing stock of the town, and in particular to be able to offer diverse housing choices instead of a Long Island-style cancer of stultifying and featureless, even if expensive, homes;
  
  
• To support the educational system of the town by helping our educators develop new facilities that are affordable and appropriate.
  

The Democrats of Ridgefield are proud to urge all our friends and neighbors to vote for for still another term on the Planning and Zoning Commission for an honest and long-term public volunteer, Dr. Nelson A. Gelfman.

The following issue papers have have been archived. They are no longer available on this web site. Please e-mail the webmaster if you would like access.

Ridgefield's Trees

A Concerned Citizenry

Dr. Gelfman on Memories Are Short

Weir Farm Is Trying To Meet Its Neighbors' Concerns

Candidate Gelfman's statement on preserving open space

Click to see Nelson Gelfman on Principled Positions and Balance

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Brought to you by the Ridgefield, Ct. Democratic Town Committee, John Kukulka, Chairman.

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