Ridgefield News
February 28, 1999

Morelli Withdraws Bypass Proposal

First Selectman Withdraws Quail Ridge Bypass Plan

Defends Personal Integrity Over Secret Proposal

Feb. 28 -- In a stunning reversal, Republican First Selectman Abe Morelli today withdrew his just-announced plan for a bypass road which would have knifed through Ridgefield's Quail Ridge and Ivy Hill communities. Bowing to a groundswell of oppositon from townspeople, the First Selectman said he had concluded that a bitter fight over the bypass would distract the Town from "other important priorities" that must be attended to.

The GOP bypass plan, a closely guarded secret for some months, was revealed to the town on Feb. 18 as a result of a Fredom of Information request from an Ivy Hill Rd. resident. The plan quickly drew heated opposition from affected residents and from Ridgefielders concerned over the secret process that produced it. To date, no accounting of town funds spent in drawing up the plan has been produced. Knowledgeable observers suggest it is possible that Town regulations governing the expenditure of public funds may not have been followed in contracting for the studies which produced the secret plan.

First Selectman Morelli presiding at a recent Board of Selectmen meeting

The First Selectman, appearing at an emergency Sunday meeting of the Quail Ridge and Ivy Hill neighborhood associations, defended the plan's secrecy on the need to complete a "feasibility study" before informing the public. The feasibility study required confidential negotiations with both Schlumberger Corp. and Connecticut Light and Power, whose properties would have been crossed by the bypass road, according to Mr. Morelli. In fact, "CL&P approval was received just days before the proposal was made public," he said. The First Selectman did not address the fact that it was the Freedom of Information demand that appeared to have forced the plan's disclosure. Also, Mr. Morelli's assertion that the Town should not inform the public about important new proposals until a feasibility study has been completed, out of the public eye, strikes some as a novel theory of governance in Ridgefield.

The First Selectman wound up his brief remarks by saying that "I take offense when my integrity is questioned," as he suggested has happened in the current debate. He told the audience that all who have worked with him know that he is a person of the highest integrity. "These types of attacks have no place in Ridgefield," Morelli concluded. Most in the audience agreed, including those who recall the 11th-hour personal smear campaign against Rudy Marconi, Mr. Morelli's opponent in the 1997 race for First Selectman. The November 1997 mud-slinging campaign against Marconi was paid for by Republicans seeking to insure Morelli's election.

The withdrawn bypass road was close to the Prospect Ridge site recently recommended by the citizen Advisory Committee as a possible location for a new school. We hope that our neighbors in the area will not let this ill-fated bypass episode sour them on giving fair consideration to the possibility of a school on the Prospect Ridge site.

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