Municipal elections really matter as the actions of New Canaan Town Council can impact our residents’ lives every single day. It’s critical that we elect residents who will advocate for local control and our municipality’s interests rather than special interests or outside agendas.
Lina Lee, candidate for Town Council, is a founder and former executive director of NYC based Communities Resist(CoRe) (https://communitiesresist.org), which according to that website is “fighting for housing justice against gentrification and displacement.”
I find challenging to reconcile such advocacy by this candidate for CoRe with New Canaan’s efforts at retaining local control of current and future housing policies. When casting a vote for a member of Town Council, voters should consider the impact the candidate’s decision making will have as a member of Town Council, where part of their responsibility will be to approve policy and possible appointments on planning, development, zoning and/or housing related boards and commissions.
The website I linked above states: “Our affirmative litigation can include cases addressing tenant harassment, discrimination, rent overcharges, necessary repairs or other legal action on behalf of tenants.” This suggests support further expansion of Fair Rent commissions in CT and specifically in New Canaan – likely another unfunded mandate on municipalities.
Another example from CoRe’s website: “Understanding that housing is a human right, the fight for tenants’ rights and housing justice must advance racial, gender, and economic justice.” This advocacy would indicate support policies like Fair Share (state mandates for towns to rezone for unfunded, state determined allocations of deeply affordable low-income housing units).
Such advocacy can also indicate support for other State housing policies that already are now impacting or will further impact New Canaan in the future like 8-30g, Fair Share and “as of right” development, also the recent State housing bill HB5002, which Governor Lamont vetoed after it was passed by Democrats alone in both the State House and State Senate.
As a founder of CT169Strong, I advocate every day for local control of zoning for all municipalities in CT and against certain State top-down mandates that would remove local discretion from local planning and zoning officials and on affordable housing. Residents should know that New Canaan’s own Democratic State Rep. Lucy Dathan and State Senator Ceci Maher voted in favor of HB5002, which would have required no parking on any development under 24 units statewide, implemented onerous Fair Share mandates on every municipality and mandated as of right conversions of commercial to residential up to 12 units statewide. Such state mandates would have adversely impacted New Canaan’s ability to maintain its character and overburdened our infrastructure. They are also unfunded state mandates that would dramatically increase our town’s budget, which I worry about as a member of New Canaan’s Board of Finance.
CT169Strong’s efforts to raise awareness of this bill resulted the grassroots outreach by residents statewide to Governor Lamont and he rightly vetoed HB5002. Where were our local Democratic leaders who helped elect those two state legislators to Hartford that voted against our municipality’s interests? Words are just words, but actions and facts matter. This local election matters and will impact the future of New Canaan, so vote reliably local – VOTE REPUBLICAN for candidates that are known commodities and actively advocate to protect our local interests, not special interests or outside political agendas.
