Business

‘New Canaan Chicken’ To Open on Elm Street in Former Chicken Joe’s Space

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Great news here for fans of the recently closed Chicken Joe’s on Elm Street: The popular eatery is reopening under new ownership with a similar though expanded menu, as early as this Thursday. ‘New Canaan Chicken’ owner Pren Lleshdedaj said he’s excited to have hired three chefs from Chicken Joe’s to work the line while making plans to expand fresh offerings such as salads and even fresh made hamburgers from scratch. “I like this little town,” the Norwalk resident said Tuesday morning as his crew hustled to prepare the space at 151 Elm St. for launch. “I am glad that I am starting something in New Canaan and I hope that it will go well.”

A Croatia native who had owned his own restaurant in Kosovo, Lleshdedaj moved to the United States in 2002 with his wife and their children, and he’s worked in the food business here, recently managing Bronx restaurant Frankie & Johnnie’s.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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2016 Cyclocross National Champion David Thompson Junior Men 9-10

Uploaded by Cyclocross Magazine on 2016-01-09.

Congratulations to New Canaan’s David Thompson, who last weekend earned the title 2016 Cyclocross National Champion in the Junior Men 9-10 division (see video above). We hear that David is a 9-year-old who attends the fourth grade at West School, and local cycling guru Lou Kozar of New Canaan Bicycles informs us (dryly) that David’s accomplishment is “kind of a big deal.”

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After impounding and multiple roaming dogs that all had invisible fence collars on them, New Canaan Animal Control Officer Allyson Halm is urging residents to double-check the batteries on those devices as well as their systems at home. A golden retriever on Skyview Lane, Labradoodle on Jelliff Mill Road and a pair of dogs on Oenoke Lane—a German shepherd and pit bull—all were collected by the New Canaan Police Department Animal Control section in recent days. ***

We’ve got the details on New Canaanite and “What’s Up With Wendy” radio show host Wendy Lowy Sloane’s sixth anniversary broadcast at 11 a.m. on 1490 AM-WGCH and online at WGCH.com. Her guests include actress Monica Potter, NBC Sports broadcaster Leigh Diffey and Bob Leary, founder of Trimino.

News

New Canaan Police Poised To Launch ‘Diversionary Program’ for Local Youths Found at Underage Drinking Parties

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Police Chief Leon Krolikowski said his department is “on the cusp” of launching its widely anticipated program that will see some young New Canaanites found with alcohol at underage drinking parties offered a chance to attend educational workshops with their parents in lieu of facing criminal infraction summonses. Several youth offenders already have been identified as prospective participants in a pilot launch of the “diversionary program,” the chief said. “They’ve been identified through previous incidents and now it’s just a matter of working with an addiction psychiatrist” to establish a curriculum for the program, Krolikowski told NewCanaanite.com. That curriculum will include information for both kids and parents about the ways that alcohol addiction can lead to abuse of narcotics such as cocaine and heroin, the chief has said. Both reducing youth access to substances in New Canaan, and the diversionary program specifically, rank among the NCPD’s goals for 2016, according to Krolikowski.

Around Town

Parks Chief: Despite Recent Cold, Pond Skating Unlikely This Winter

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First night of ice skating at Mead Pond Feb 18 2015

Uploaded by Michael Dinan on 2015-02-19.

After sustained cold last winter delivered New Canaan’s first ice skating season on Mead Pond in six years, officials say—despite recent lower temperatures—the prospect of repeating that cherished town tradition is unlikely. A few cold nights have helped cool down the water and some ice has formed on the pond, “but it’s a long, long ways from what we need to have skating out there,” said John Howe, parks superintendent in the New Canaan Department of Public Works. “Extended cold weather would help, especially if it stays dry, and if it stays below freezing all day you can develop up to an inch of ice a day. But that would be the maximum, so even if we got cold today, you are talking about a minimum of a [full] week and unfortunately, I don’t see that happening.”

Scores of New Canaanites headed to Mead Pond last February to ice skate and play hockey, including under the lights after dark—at one time a regular annual tradition that changed more than a dozen years ago when the town changed insurers and a full six inches of ice was required to green light it. Many attribute changes in temperature patterns—specifically, suddenly warmish, 40-degree days in the midst of a cold spell—with preventing the ponds from freezing over.

Government

Health Insurance Costs Drive Superintendent of Schools’ Proposed 6.4 Percent Increase in Spending

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Superintendent of Schools Dr. Bryan Luizzi on Monday night proposed an operating budget for the district of $88,541,473 in fiscal year 2017—a 6.4 percent increase over current spending. Of the overall $5.3 million increase in proposed spending, two-thirds is driven by health insurance—the end result, Board of Education Chair Dionna Carlson said, of a policy developed by district and town officials three years ago (more on that below), whereby reserves have been taken to understate insurance expenses. “We did it year after year after year to the point where we said, ‘There is going to be a year where you cannot take more reserves and you will have huge jump in your insurance number,’ and this is the year,” Carlson said during the meeting and first read of Luizzi’s budget, held in the Wagner Room at New Canaan High School. Specifically, under the proposed FY17 budget (available here as a PDF), the district would spend about $14.1 million on health insurance next year, up from $10.5 million this year. “This is the year, and so we need to focus on [the fact that] it is a [2.1] percent educational budget increase—it is not a [6.4 percent increase].