Will was often described as a “Renaissance Man”. Not only was he passionate about his family, traditional music, design, antique cars, gardening, building stonewalls, travel, historical home, barn & farmland preservation, and musical & spiritual fellowship, Will also managed to excel at most every endeavor. He was proud to have completed and published his life memoirs, entitled “Start-Ups, Setbacks, Surprises, Strategies, Solutions & Success” just the week preceding his death.
Will attended elementary school in Geneva, NY and graduated from Staples High School in Westport, CT in 1948. Will received a B.A. in Industrial Design from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY in 1952 and after his graduation, enlisted in the U.S. Coast Guard. He was appointed to Officer Candidate School at the US Coast Guard Academy in New London, CT, was commissioned as an Ensign in December 1953. Will was assigned as an Officer on the USCGC Campbell from 1954-1955 and was later promoted to Lieutenant, Junior Grade and assigned as a Watch Officer at the USCG Rescue Coordination Center in NYC from 1955-1956.
From 1956-1972, Will focused on his industrial design career, having worked for John Sonoda, custom furniture designer in Darien, CT, for Jakob Jensen Design in Copenhagen, Denmark, and for The University of Bridgeport as a professor of Industrial Design for 13 years. In 1980, Will took over as President and CEO of his father’s agriculture, nutrition, food and hospitality publishing business, AVI Publishing Company, where Will had worked in print layout and graphic design.
Will’s private architectural design practice grew steadily from 1962 to 2008 as word spread of his exceptional hand-drafting abilities and personalized, historically-accurate, and form-meets-function residential designs. Will also devoted countless hours to his many musical endeavors, hobbies, and preservation causes. From the early 1960s, Will was a member of the Easton Banjo Society and a founding member/organizer of The Jackson Pike Skifflers, in which he performed with his immediate family and various other exceptional musicians over the years. He had the honor to play music at many venues during his life including The White House in Washington, D.C., Lincoln Center in NYC, the Great Hudson River Revival concerts with Pete Seeger, the Bridgeport Rescue Mission as part of a gospel music ministry, Christ Church of Easton for the annual Christmas concert/fundraiser, and of course, the much-loved Tressler Barn, home to many concerts, parties, and hootenannies. It was Will’s love of music and his participation in many summer concert series that prompted him to rally for a gazebo/bandstand in Easton; His early efforts in the 1980s finally came to fruition with the help of other activists and music-lovers, when one was constructed on the Easton Community Center grounds in 2009.
Will, also affectionately known as “Easton’s Rural Character”, was a founding member of the Citizens for Easton (CFE), a group “working to protect the beauty and character of Easton”. He was involved in the creation of the Easton Agricultural Commission and the Morehouse Road farming initiative on municipal land and he also served as the Architectural Preservation Advisor for the Historical Society of Easton.
Visiting hours will be held from 5-8pm on Thursday, January 5th at Commerce Hill Funeral Home located at 4798 Main Street in Bridgeport, CT. The funeral service will be held at 10 am on Friday, January 6th at Christ Church located at 59 Church Rd. in Easton, CT. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations to the Mary McCann Bradicich Fund, Bridgeport Rescue Mission, or the CFE Farm Trust be sent to 146 Bibbins Rd. Easton, CT 06612.

And a big thank you goes 0ut to those who worked to make the event such a success! Without our dedicated volunteers this event could never have happened.

Most of all, thank you to the farmers in Easton who continue to till the  land and bring forth  healthful bounties of locally produced agricultural products. We consider ourselves truly blessed to live in a town when it is possible to drive, bike, or walk down the road and purchase locally grown fruits and vegetables that come straight from a neighbor’s field to our tables within hours of picking.

Thank you all, and remember: Easton *is* a Farmer’s Market – you don’t have to wait for the Farm Tour to visit our farms and get fresh goods straight from the earth! Come anytime! Our farms and farmers will be waiting for you, and won’t disappoint you!

Come to the Easton Farm Tour this Saturday, August 13, from 10 AM to 2 PM. Fun for the whole family! See where real food comes from. Show up on the Easton Firehouse Green any time between 10 am and 2pm and pick up a map for this self-guided tour.

For more information visit our Farm Tour page or send email to farmtour@citizensforeaston.org

It is anticipated that the final public hearing on the 99 unit Saddle Ridge application will take place Monday, June 13, 8 PM at the HKMS media center.

If you remember, at the last IWC meeting, pursuant to a request by IWC, after consultation with his client, Attorney Ranelli agreed to extend the public hearing until June 13th. All parties had a “gentlemen’s agreement” that all new documents be submitted by May 31.

Ranelli submitted a new set of documents on Thursday afternoon, June 9.

We encourage everyone who would like to comment on this application to write to the Commission by June 13th, or alternatively, to attend the meeting and voice your comments.

Krista Kot is the Conservation Commission Secretary. Her email is kkot@eastonct.gov.

Remember this is the Conservation Commission, so all comments should address concerns relating to the wetlands, watercourses, and public drinking water supply.

I had previously attached letters from our experts responding to the rebuttals of their reports by the developer’s engineer.

If you would like copies of these or any additional documents please let me know. They are all part of the public record.

Thank you for your support

Leslie

In a letter of March 24th the Aquarion Water Company indicates that they continue to be in strong opposition to the planned development. Aquarion points out that the plan is inconsistent with state standards established to protect public watershed areas. Aquariony includes a quote from a ruling made by Superior Court Judge Cohn in a highly similar case in Ridgefield:

“Intensive development of the Saugatuck Watershed is contrary to State policy. The weight of evidence indicates that restricting the development of the Saugatuck Watershed lands is necessary for the protection of a substantial public interest. Protection of state water resources is not only consistent with, but also a focus of state laws. The protection of a source of public drinking water clearly outweighs the need for affordable housing. Intensive development of the Saugatuck Watershed poses more than a mere theoretical possibility of harm to the public drinking water”

Read the complete Aquarion letter here 

The Connecticut Department of Public Health raised similar issues in its letter of May 9th. It list numerous Drinking Water Supply concerns.
Read the complete Connecticut Department of Public Health letter here

Two technical experts were engaged to review the plans submitted to planning and zoning. These experts discovered numerous flaws and inconsistencies potentially impacting the plan’s effect on the public watershed. Letters submitted by these technical experts can be found below.
Letter from Environmental Planning Services
Letter from Trinkus Engineering

The last public hearing on the Saddle Ridge Applications before the Conservation Commission  will be May 24, 2011 at 8 PM in the Helen Keller Middle School Media Center. For those who have not been following this issue, the Saddle Ridge developers are attempting to break Easton zoning and build high density housing in the public water supply watershed.
On February 14, 2011, our Planning and Zoning Commission unanimously denied the applications by Saddle Ridge Developers, LLC to construct 105 townhouses on 110.5 acres of property on the public water supply watershed located at Sport Hill Rd, Silver Hill Rd, Cedar Hill Rd, and Route 136.

On March 4^th, 2011, Saddle Ridge amended their proposal to reduce the number of units by 6, to construct 99 townhouses, and made some engineering changes to the plans.

The plans were submitted under Connecticut General Statute 8-30g which allows developers to break zoning laws as long as 30% of the development is set aside as affordable housing .

Conservation does not have to address the affordable housing issue, they only need consider the impact on the waters, including but not limited to watercourses, wetlands, and reservoirs, during construction and after completion.

Turnout for these hearings has been poor. While public opinion can have no bearing on the outcome as it must be decided on its merits, it is still important to show the Commissioners that we very much care about the outcome of this decision as it not only impacts Easton, but also over 600,000 users of the waters of our reservoirs.

So please consider attending to let the Commissioners know that we really do care about the impact of this development, which would change the environment forever.

Map of Helen Keller Middle School location

In The Connecticut Post     In The Daily Easton

In The Easton Courier      In The Weston-Redding-EastonPatch