Did You Hear … ?

Congratulations to the Pauley family on the birth of baby girl Peyton Ann Elaine Joyner. The daughter of Michael Joyner and Lauren Pauley—and granddaughter of recently retired New Canaan Tree Warden Bruce Pauley and his wife, Elaine—Peyton was born at 10:04 p.m. on July 14 at Norwalk Hospital. Lauren Pauley is a 2000 Trinity Catholic High School graduate. The Joyner family resides in Stamford. ***

New Canaan High School 2015 graduate and football standout Zach Allen will wear No.

Town Pursues Mandatory $20 Per-Player ‘Fields Usage’ Fee from Private Youth Sports Groups

Seeking insight into the true membership numbers and financials of private organizations that run youth sports in New Canaan, town officials plan next year to make mandatory a $20 per-player “fields usage” fee. Led by Park & Recreation Commission Chair Sally Campbell and Selectman Nick Williams and launched through the Youth Sports Committee, the move is designed, in part, to usher New Canaan toward a system where basic upkeep of playing fields is accounted for through above-the-line payments rather than private contributions. In the past, the town had no oversight of the financials of groups that oversee sports such as youth football, lacrosse, baseball, soccer and field hockey, Campbell said during the committee’s Jan. 29 meeting. As a result, she said, “we had groups that ended up having big cash reserves because they were collecting fees way in excess of what they needed to use.”

“So our point to them was, look, you know parents aren’t going to question the fee—because they want their kid to participate, they want them to make the A team and nobody would question it,” Campbell said at the meeting, held in the Art Room at Lapham Community Center.

Town Officials Want More Consistency in Fees, Fields Use among Youth Sports Programs

Saying youth sports in New Canaan must be treated equally—in terms of field access and use, for example—town officials on Monday night talked about setting uniform standards for all programs and making mandatory a newly calculated, across-the-board per-player fee for fields upkeep and upgrades. New Canaan in divvying up coveted—and, with youth sports themselves expanding, increasingly scarce—access to playing fields at public parks, is “at the mercy” of groups that may stake a claim by funding capital improvements, Selectman Nick Williams said at the Youth Sports Committee meeting. “That’s got to stop,” Williams said at the meeting, held in the Training Room at the New Canaan Police Department. “As a town we need to start telling the sports, ‘First of all, you’ll all be treated equally at the outset, and you’ll all be charged the same fee and by the way, girls and boys, same fee. And then we’ll move on from that.