HAMDEN — In 1969, local conservationists first approached the owner of a 102.5-acre contaminated property in the southern part of town about cleaning it up and turning it into a state park.
More than half a century later, Six Lakes is still heavily polluted and closed to the public, despite growing calls for remediation and a strong desire from the state to preserve more undeveloped land as open space.
On Sunday afternoon a crowd of nearly 100 people, from citizens to activists to numerous elected officials, converged on the parking lot of ACES Whitney High School North on Leeder Hill Drive in Hamden. The purpose of the visit was the land behind the high school — 102 acres of forest, lakes, and wetlands, closed off from the public for decades because of its use as a place to test firearms and munitions and dispose of toxic waste…
