Board of Finance

First Selectman: Tenant Lined Up for Former Outback Teen Center

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New Canaan’s highest elected official said last week that the town believes it has a tenant lined up to rent the upper floor of the long-vacant former Outback Teen Center building behind Town Hall. The town also is “working on a proposal to move Human Services to the lower level of the Outback,” First Selectman Kevin Moynihan told members of the Board of Finance during their special meeting Oct. 23. “We think we have a private renter for the upper level,” he said at the meeting, held in Town Hall. “We will make that building operate on two separate levels independently.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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The pre-American Revolution era White Oak Shade Road home that made headlines recently when its new owners started to demolish part of it without a permit—then claimed it was a misunderstanding, only to raze the whole structure—is back on social media. The owners posted on Facebook Marketplace that they’re selling the “antique original beams” from the antique house ($150 apiece). On July 13 they applied to the New Canaan Building Department for a permit on an estimated $280,000 job that will include “alteration of first and second floor of existing foundation walls” and “adding four bedrooms and 4.5 baths.”

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Police on Tuesday picked up what they described as a sad-looking, lethargic crow sitting on Elm Street. Officer Allyson Halm of the New Canaan Police Department’s Animal Control section said a veterinarian who examined the bird found nothing physically wrong with it, though officials with Wildlife In Crisis said the crow most likely was suffering from West Nile Virus. ***

Congratulations to Selectman Kit Devereaux on the birth of her first grandchild. 

William Fielding Colestock entered the world July 18, born to Devereaux’s daughter Anne Devereaux (Geitz) Colestock and Mac Colestock.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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First Selectman Kevin Moyinhan said during a media briefing Thursday that he’s asked one of New Canaan’s foremost nonprofit figures—Leo Karl III—to lead the New Canaan Athletic Foundation. Karl, known for his extensive volunteer work with organizations that include the New Canaan Community Foundation, where he had served as president, agreed to take on the role, according to Moynihan. Praised by Moynihan for its fundraising ability, the NCAF among other organizational priorities is seeking to establish its own nonprofit arm along the lines of what a similar  group has in Darien, the first selectman said. ***

A Darien homeowner is taking a New Canaan man and his company to small claims court for $4,660.32, saying he committed breach of contract by failing to complete painting work, sealing broken plumbing behind “impenetrable tile and drywall work” and incorrectly installing tile, according to a complaint filed in May. In an answer and counterclaim, the New Canaan man said he’s owed $2,089.63 and that the plaintiff is suing for work not included in the contract.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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The town on Feb. 27 received an application to build Merritt Village, the 110-unit complex on the Maple and Park Streets block at the edge of downtown New Canaan, approved in November 2016 by the Planning & Zoning Commission. The application calls for four multi-family residential buildings with 167,746 gross square feet and a combination of underground and surface parking. ***

And now, a photo of Parking Enforcement Officer Mike McCargo with New Canaan’s Lummi Roscoe, a Pomeranian. ***

The Board of Finance on Thursday night voted unanimously to approve a town-wide budget for next fiscal year of $150.9 million—an overall increase of 1.89 percent—including a Board of Education operating budget of $89.7 million.

Government

‘It Will Not Be Easy and It Will Not Be Pleasant’: Board of Finance Hears Passionate Calls for Fiscal Prudence, Full District Funding as Vote Nears

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New Canaan must be careful as a community to have frank, detailed conversations about its financial situation and not “succumb to the tyranny of the parent,” a homeowner and mother of four children in public elementary and middle schools here told members of the Board of Finance on Tuesday. Everyone loves their kids and wants a good school district, yet this idea floating around New Canaan now that spending on the public schools somehow fuels property values is false, according to Rita Nagle. “That is simply not the economic relationship that exists,” Nagle said during a budget hearing held at Town Hall. “Property values fund taxes, which fund school spending. That is the way the relationship works.