You asked how towns can form a regional planning agency (RPA). You stated that towns have already formed 15 such agencies and that a group of towns may want to form a 16th.

RPA AS A REGIONAL PLANNING ORGANIZATION

An RPA is one of three types of regional planning organization towns may create in a state-designated planning region. The other types are regional councils of government and regional councils of elected officials. Towns that create a regional council of government cannot also create an RPA. But they must create a regional planning commission to prepare regional plans. Towns that create a regional council of elected officials may establish and operate a separate RPA.

Only those towns within one of the state’s 15 planning regions may create a regional planning organization. Since Stafford and Union are the only towns that do not fall within a region, they cannot establish any regional planning organization or join an existing one. The Office of Policy and Management (OPM) can designate the geographic area comprising the two towns as a region or include them in the adjacent regions (CGS § 16a-4a(4)).

The former Connecticut Development Commission designated the regions during the 1950s to prevent the proliferation of geographically small planning regions and organizations. But towns within a region can petition the OPM secretary to subdivide the region, which he may do only if the proposed region would better address the towns’ needs (CGS § 16a-4b).

As Attachment 1 shows, eight regions have councils of government, five have RPAs, and two have regional councils of elected officials. Attachment 2 is a map depicting the planning regions.

ESTABLISHING AN RPA

The statutes specify the procedures towns must follow for creating, governing, and dissolving an RPA. At least 60% of the region’s towns must agree to create an RPA. The participating towns’ legislative bodies must enact ordinances adopting the RPA statutes. The other towns can subsequently join the RPA by doing the same.

Each participating town gets two representatives on the RPA’s board, and those with more than 25,000 people get an extra representative for each 50,000 people (CGS § 8-31a).

A town can leave the RPA six months after its legislative body adopts an ordinance declaring its intent to do so (CGS § 8-36a). The RPA ceases to exist once 40% of the member towns decide to terminate it (CGS § 8-37a).

Table 1: Regional Planning Organizations

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