As a professional AICP certified planner for over 25 years, Hiram has worked with municipalities, the federal government/USDA, regional planning agencies, and private clients. His focus has always been on the land and man’s optimal relation to it. As Director of Planning in Simsbury, Hiram has worked extensively on consensus building processes. Recently these involved a community design charrette and adoption of a Form-Based Code for Simsbury Town Center. He has been working with several firms and groups in many states on Form Based Codes for over 6 years. Other recent efforts include drafting a Planned Area Development (PAD) regulation which was recently adopted in Simsbury. Two PADs have already produced a restored grist mill restaurant, 88 apartments, 20 townhouses and MS housing project and an urgent care facility in Simsbury. Work on Low Impact Development (LID) storm water policies and regulations and Workforce Housing Development Zones were also recently adopted. Other current endeavors include significant mixed use development, specialty housing and transit related projects. Before coming to Simsbury seven years ago, Hiram was the Town Planner in New Canaan, CT for seven years. During this time, the POCD and Zoning Regulations were completely revised and many major projects including construction of a teen center and the preservation of an important historic downtown theater and other town owned historic buildings were accomplished. Hiram was also the Senior Planner and then Assistant Town Planner in Greenwich, CT for seven years and did coastal application reviews and assisted with the update of the POCD. Previously he had worked with the eight towns in the South Western Regional Planning Agency region in Fairfield County when he worked for SWRPA on many environmental projects. He has also worked for COGCNV in Waterbury, CT on environmental and transit programs. Before his service as a U.S. Army Officer, Hiram attended Cornell University and the University of Connecticut. He has taught science at the secondary level and geology at the college level. He is also a consulting planner and a CT licensed arborist. He has also served on the Board of Selectmen and Board of Tax Review in his hometown. He is also a CNU member for the past few years. In his spare time he enjoys showing his Parson Russell terriers and bicycling, although not at the same time.

Dedication to Smart Growth and New Urbanism led Jonathan Ford to found Morris Beacon Design, a New Urbanist civil engineering consulting firm, in 2006. Jonathan’s experience is diverse: in addition to fifteen years as a consulting civil engineer he is co-founder and past president of the New England Chapter of the Congress for the New Urbanism, a Knight Fellow in Community Building at the University of Miami’s School of Architecture, and on the faculty of the Form-Based Codes Institute. Jonathan has been published and has lectured across the country on a range of topics including walkable neighborhood design, density for watershed health, and Smart Growth infrastructure planning. He is a licensed Professional Engineer in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, North Carolina, and several other states.  Jon and his family live in walkable Providence, Rhode Island.