Depending on whom you ask, Broad Brook Country Club would be a boon to Preston's tax base, or violate the state's farmland preservation program.
And both sides of the proposed development are digging in, with owners moving ahead on development and state officials warning against it.
At the heart of the matter is a question of development rights. Former owner Joseph Koniecko enrolled the 165-acre farm on Route 164 in the state's Farmland Preservation Program in 1986.
Under the program, development rights revert to the state, and the owner can only develop the property within certain definitions. But the parties differ sharply on those definitions.
Attorney William Moller, representing trustees Virginia Landis and Fred Peacos, argues that his clients' proposal - an 18-hole golf course and a 132-seat restaurant, to employ 20 people - meets the definition of agriculture use under state law.
"Here dairy farmers are going out of business like crazy," Moller said. "Here's an opportunity for a farm - it's not a productive farm - to put something very attractive in the area, and increase the town's grand list."
Work already has begun on the property, the lawyer said. But the state opposes the golf course.
The state Department of Agriculture has told the town the owners do not have the right to develop the property.
State Agriculture Commissioner Bruce Grescyzk said the statutes on the program require specific farming activities, such as planting and livestock raising, to take place on property enrolled in the program, designed to preserve open space in the state. When we get into significant (excavations), fill and non-agricultural uses like a clubhouse, that doesn't fall under agriculture," Grescyzk said. "We have our covenants in place. The development rights were purchased by the state."
On July 16, State Attorney General Richard Blumenthal wrote to Moller, saying the proposal "violates the plain language and spirit of Connecticut's Farmland Preservation Program."
Blumenthal warned that "legally unfounded action" would require Landis and Peacos to restore the property to its rural state.
Moller, however, cites a January ruling by New London Superior Court Judge D. Michael Hurley that said the "state's interest is merely in the nature of an easement," which he interprets as only forbidding residential construction on the property.
"Not only is a golf course allowable, but it's considered open space," Moller said. "It's considered the nature of growing grass, trees and the like."
In response, Blumenthal and Grescyzk cite a June 29 decision by Judge Robert Martin, also in New London Superior Court, saying owners only have a right to develop the land for agricultural and farming purposes.
The golf course has gone through the town's approval process, and Preston First Selectman Robert Congdon said the project met all the town's regulations on land use.
"We contacted the state to take a stand on this early on, so the developer would not go through undue costs, and the town would not go through undue costs," he said. "So the state did not take an aggressive stand on this until after it was approved, and approved through the land-use commissions. I can understand this opens up a real Pandora's Box for the state."
A Superior Court last February threw out an attempt to develop a 127-acre farm in Eastford, after the owner's heirs attempted to challenge the decision in state court.
The previous owner had rewritten a 1973 will deeding her land to the state; an heir challenged the will in court.
Source: Norwich Bulletin