Around Town

Copper Beech Planted by Waveny House as Locals Honor Ted Winpenny on Arbor Day

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The head of New Canaan’s Public Tree Board gathered with a selectman and small group of locals on the windswept field by Waveny House on Friday morning to dedicate a newly planted copper beech tree to the memory a civic-minded New Canaan man. This year’s Arbor Day planting was dedicated to Ted Winpenny, a man whose numerous activities in New Canaan made it difficult for the board to decide just where to plan the tree, board Chairman Tom Cronin said. “Do we plant the tree at Mead Park, where Ted helped organize the annual Labor Day doubles tennis tournaments?” Cronin said, as Winpenny’s daughter and grandson, Belinda and Benjamin Paris, stood nearby. “Do we plant it on Cherry Street, in front of the New Canaan Community Foundation that he helped to establish, which is an organization that has soon will hit a milestone of more than $10 million to local charities since its inception? Do we plant near Waveny Care Center, where Ted volunteered for so many years?

Government

Tree Pruning Planned for Public School Grounds

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With an eye on safety as well as aesthetics, New Canaan will spend about $38,000 to prune trees around the playgrounds and perimeters of the public schools. The Board of Selectmen unanimously approved those funds during its regular meeting Tuesday, part of an overall allocation of $74,913 at the request of Tree Warden (and fourth-generation New Canaanite) Bruce Pauley. Pauley said he’s wanted to get to the schools “for a couple of years.”

“But I’ve been holding back and I guess it’s just somewhat gun shy fro the amount of trees that have been coming down after all the storms but we are getting to the point now where can start concentrating on pruning which is where I wanted to be when I first started the job,” Pauley said during the selectmen’s meeting, held in the Training Room at the New Canaan Police Department, “Deputy Tree Warden” Bheema (“I post the trees, he marks ‘em”), his German Shepherd dog, at his side. The work will be done by two different tree service companies—Almstead and Qualey—in party, Pauley said, because he’d like to see the work done in a timely fashion. “I want to see it done before the leaves come up, it’s a cleaner job that way,” he said.

Government

Officials Consider Moving Away from New Canaan Police for Traffic Control during Roadside Tree Work

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Town officials say it’s possible to save taxpayer dollars by moving away from a system that sees New Canaan Police Department officers, rather than less expensive private contractors, directing motor vehicle traffic during roadside work on public trees. So long as it’s equally safe to have private companies or tree service providers themselves use their own flagmen, New Canaan could save “a big chunk of change” to the tune of $20 per hour instead of the police department’s $65, Selectman Beth Jones said at the board’s Nov. 18 meeting. “I wish we could negotiate that more,” Jones said at the meeting, held in the Training Room of the New Canaan Police Department. The discussion came up as the selectmen approved an approximately $23,000 contract with Mill River Tree Service (for pruning and removal of trees at 21 locations all told, see page six of the public packet here for details).

Around Town

Fourth-Generation New Canaanite Bruce Pauley Marks Four Years as Tree Warden

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Bruce Pauley never met his great uncle Charlie, who owned a tree care business in New Canaan in the 1930s and 1940s. Still, that snippet of family history may be the best explanation for just why being outdoors and working with trees—evaluating, pruning, removing, relocating, planting—has sustained Pauley for his entire professional career, really his entire life. By the time his father built the house up on Briscoe Road where the family would settle, Pauley recalled, “I happened to take an interest in trees.”

“I was intrigued by the idea of climbing trees from when I was a kid, I guess, everybody does,” he said, standing by a newly planted maple off of the main road through Waveny, one of 15 going in toward Lapham and also in the dog park. “And I just kept doing it when other people got smarter and decided to go make money instead. And I’ve just never thought of doing anything else as being compelling.”

This month marks four years in the role of tree warden for Pauley, a stewardship that has seen major changes in the way that New Canaan cares for its public trees, and by a man who arrived at his singular and abiding vocation as much by philosophy as practical consideration.

Government

Officials: Consultation Should Be Mandated for Homeowners Prior to Building Stone Walls Near Public Trees

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Among the 33 dead and dying trees that New Canaan will pay about $20,000 to remove following a Board of Selectmen vote this week are an ash and hickory on Ponus Ridge that fell into in such poor condition for a specific reason: A stone wall was built too close to where they had grown—in this case, right up against them—likely causing fatal root damage. It’s a problem that Tree Warden Bruce Pauley said most homeowners, who truly don’t want to lose trees, are unaware of and that could addressed by a new rule with stone wall installations that requires a check-in when public trees—typically those fronting New Canaan roads—are at stake. The two trees on Ponus mark the fifth time that trees have been killed by root damage and grade changes along a road during construction of a stone wall, Pauley said Tuesday at the selectmen’s regular meeting. Pauley requested that that the tree warden, together with the building department, have some input as to what will be the likely outcome for trees for people putting up stone wall “and if they are to put in a stone wall, they have to assume responsibility of the price of tree removal if it kills the tree, and pruning if it kills the limbs, for a minimum of five years, because that is how long it would take in some cases for the tree to fully die.”

“These trees belong to all of us, and somebody puts in a stone wall, thereby killing the tree, and now we have to pay to remove the tree,” Pauley said during the meeting, held in the Training Room at the New Canaan Police Department. First Selectman Rob Mallozzi said he supported the purpose behind the consultation and would discuss what could be done with town attorney Ira Bloom.