A 74-year-old homeowner in Bethel, Connecticut, has been ordered to either restore a brook behind his home to its previous condition or seek a wetlands permit for work he carried out there without approval. According to a September 13 report by the News-Times, Mark Bjorken had moved rocks, reinforced sections of the banks of Limekiln Brook and built a bridge across the watercourse as he tried to protect his property from erosion. Bjorken bought the single-family home on Rockwell Road about 10 years ago, and the brook runs so close to the house that he told the newspaper he can stand in his bedroom, open the window and fish. On September 10, Connecticut Superior Court Judge Barbara Brazzel-Massaro upheld the decision of Bethel's Inland Wetlands Commission, finding that Bjorken had not established that his work was exempt from the town's wetlands regulations.
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