“Grasslands and meadows are among the most threatened and rare habitats in Connecticut,” reads a 10-page management plan for the meadow by Newtown’s Conservation Commission. “(I)t is important to recognize that the 6 Commerce Road parcel is part of a larger significant swath of bird habitat from High Meadow and stretching across Wasserman Way through Governor’s Field and the fields owned by the state and the town along Deep Brook and up to Queen Street.”

The management plan for the town-owned meadow, which calls for removing invasive weeds and rotating the mowing schedule to help wintering birds, could be voted on as soon as Tuesday by the Conservation Commission. Once First Selectman Bruce Walczak signs the plan, the meadow will be added to the inventory of 2,000 open space acres managed by the commission.

The routine-sounding process caps a dramatic reversal of fortune for a meadow that was given to Newtown by the state to be used for economic development. The meadow became a rallying cry for conservationists and environmental-minded activists after the Sandy Hook mother who founded an animal sanctuary in her slain daughter’s memory next door to the meadow spoke out against a plans to develop it with 170 units of senior housing.

“It is quite the saga,” said Steve Maguire, Newtown’s deputy land use director.

The short version of the saga is that the Greenwich developer withdrew his senior housing proposal after an outcry in 2023, and conservationists persuaded leaders here and in Hartford to change the land’s use designation in the deed from economic development to recreation and open space.

Conservationists argued that open space preservation was form of economic development and pointed to programs and outreach of the Catherine Violet Hubbard Animal Sanctuary as an example.

In addition to changes in the way the meadow is managed, the meadow will no longer be called by its street address.

“The commission agreed upon Pootatuck Meadows, named after the original inhabitants of the property, the Pootatuck Tribe,” according to the commission’s June meeting minutes.