Off-Grid Living in Hampton, Connecticut

I've been digging through Hampton, Connecticut's zoning regulations and the Eastern Highlands Health District (EHHD) materials to figure out what off-grid living actually looks like here, and the short version is: Hampton is a real zoned town with a rural character it takes seriously, so "off-grid" doesn't mean "do whatever you want on your land."

Zoning. Hampton IS zoned, administered by the Planning & Zoning Commission and enforced locally by a Zoning Enforcement Officer. The town's regulations state their purpose is preserving Hampton's rural character, and they require that any structure or land use conform to the district it sits in. One dwelling per lot of record is generally the rule. There's also a soil-based buildable-area standard I found in the regs: a lot needs a chunk of contiguous soil that isn't wetlands or shallow-to-bedrock to even qualify as buildable, which can restrict what you can do on rougher parcels.

Dwellings, tiny homes, RVs. I didn't find any Hampton-specific tiny house or RV-as-residence ordinance. That means it falls back to the State Building Code as administered by Hampton's Building Department, alongside the zoning district's dimensional standards. If you're picturing an RV as a permanent home, I'd call the Zoning Enforcement Officer before you buy the land.

Building permits. Hampton's Building Department (per its official page) handles building, electrical, plumbing, and heating permits and issues Certificates of Occupancy, all under the State of Connecticut Building Code plus local zoning and historic district rules.

Septic and wells. This town doesn't run its own health department. It's covered by the Eastern Highlands Health District (EHHD), which handles septic permitting (site work, soil testing, plan review, inspections, all tied to the CT Public Health Code) and well permitting (working with the state Department of Consumer Protection). A licensed well driller submits your well permit to EHHD. Composting toilets aren't addressed separately anywhere I found, so I'd ask EHHD directly.

Greywater. I found nothing Hampton- or EHHD-specific here, so this one is genuinely unclear. Confirm directly with EHHD before setting anything up.

Rainwater. No local restriction beyond the general State Building Code baseline that the Building Department administers, so this looks fine to pursue, but check in if your system ties into plumbing or structures needing a permit.

Full utility disconnection. Nothing in Hampton's rules explicitly bans living off the grid utility-wise, but Certificates of Occupancy tie back to state code compliance, and septic/well approval from EHHD is typically part of getting there. So full disconnection is possible in practice, just wrapped inside the normal permitting process rather than singled out.

Bottom line: nothing here is impossible, but almost everything routes through either the Hampton Building Department, the Zoning Enforcement Officer, or EHHD. Start with a phone call before you commit to land or a build plan.