By Sarah Opdahl

New Fairfield’s Permanent Building Committee (PBC) discussed the bus lot at their Tuesday, July 8 meeting and agreed to move forward with creating a modified lot design for 302 Ball Pond Road to submit to the Zoning Commission. The modified design will include updates that were provided by the engineer who completed the bus lot study, Mr. Ben Doto, and  feature a new exit onto Gilotti Road. With concerns that the Doto design may limit future development of the site, PBC Chair Mr. Don Kellogg said, “I don’t necessarily think that [his] layout needs to be the final design, but I think design elements of it should be incorporated,” such as the new exit with placement alterations. Another proposed solution may include two exits, with one serving as the primary and the other gated.

PBC members considered possibly resubmitting the original design to Zoning, which was the start of the legal matter between the Commission and the Town, but they agreed to scuttle that plan in favor of the modified design. With Doto unable to complete the work, the PBC surmised that the logical plan will be to ask Langan Engineering, who created the original design, to complete the plans, rather than going out to bid on the work. One perceived drawback was that there is political “baggage” in the work that was originally created with Langan, however PBC Chair Mr. Don Kellogg pointed out that Zoning’s “baggage is with us, not necessarily the engineer.” It was agreed that Colliers International’s staff will create a scope for Langan, which JCJ Architecture’s team will send to them.

Colliers International’s Mr. Mark Schweitzer shared that the propane report is still in a draft review and they are waiting for a revised final report from AmTech, who is helping to analyze the cause for the lengthy propane failures at the high school. He also explained that the science tables that had water present in their propane lines were re-examined, “on June 27, we opened up the flex lines underneath the science tables…five out of the six tables had water in them, not an awful lot. There’s only one table that had an awful lot in it, but the other ones had drops in them.” There is a plan to replace the faucets, but the type of faucets with which to replace them is in discussion.

Schweitzer explained that he and school officials met with the playground inspector, who relayed that there are some changes to make prior to the playground play surface installation, which will be requested in a proposal in the near future. He explained that the installer is committed to completing the play surface this summer, which should take approximately two weeks, once they “get going with the demo.” 

There was an update on the new Gillotti Road crosswalk at the high/middle school’s primary exit, which is slated to begin in late July and was on hold for a parts delivery. A long-awaited solution to a wire management issue in the high school’s computer labs is on hold for the installer to commit to a date for installation. There is hope that this will be resolved before the school year begins. An update on the former Consolidated property included the news that the pavement is complete, but the grass needs reseeding, as there are many bare areas. They will wait until after the Town carnival occurs. PBC members asked O&G’s Mr. Joe Vetro to ensure that there is a plan for watering the new grass.

The next regular New Fairfield Permanent Building Committee is scheduled for Tuesday, July 22, 7:30 p.m.