Government

Meet the New Canaan Charter Revision Commission

By |

 

Members of a newly formed commission charged with studying the governing document of New Canaan—with an eye on recommending updates for a town-wide vote on Election Day 2016—on Wednesday voted a former delegate to the state legislature as their chairman. John Hetherington of Valley Road will serve as chairman of the Charter Revision Commission, following a unanimous vote at the group’s first meeting, held at Town Hall. See the gallery above for some background on each of the commission’s 10 members, as they introduced themselves in turn at the meeting. After commissioners been sworn in by Town Clerk Claudia Weber, Town Council Vice Chair addressed the group. Asked during an interview after the meeting about the importance of the task before them, Karl said: “The importance is that these folks who know New Canaan like the back of their hand are going to look at the Charter, the DNA of the town, and review anything that should be changed or revised, and it hasn’t been done in 10 years.”

Commissioners agreed to set a schedule whereby they would meet twice per month with an eye on getting a draft proposal to the Town Council next April.

Government

Charter Review: Town Spent $46,000 Last Year in Print Newspaper Public Notices

By |

The town spent about $46,000 last fiscal year advertising public notices in local print newspapers—a practice that officials call expensive for taxpayers and which may change as a soon-to-be-appointed commission reviews New Canaan’s major governing document. The Town Council has sketched a timeline whereby a Charter Revision Commission will be appointed, with an eye on recommending updates to the Town Charter that would appear—following multiple public hearings and reports, as required by state law—on the ballot for the November 2016 general elections. Among changes to consider—as recommend by a committee of the Town Council five years ago, following interviews with the heads of town departments and municipal boards and commissions—is this (see pages 185-188 of this council meeting’s public packet): “Some commissions are bound by [state] statutes which require the entire content to be published. Are there ways to notice meetings in a more cost-effective way (e.g. website, referral to website in public notice)?”

Asked about the public noticing issue in particular, Town Councilman Penny Young—who had served on the 2010 committee—said “the idea was posed for several reasons.”

“One is the cost involved in taking an ad out, in printing it in the newspaper. And secondly, the development of other media modes that had not existed 10 years ago as they do now.

Government

As Review of Town Charter Nears, Question of Police Role in Traffic Control Re-emerges

By |

The town could pay contracted certified flagmen about half of what police earn in overseeing traffic control jobs—such as for roadside tree work—and an upcoming review of New Canaan’s governing document may provide an opportunity to bring about the change, officials say. Under Article II, Section 54-41 of the Town Code, the police chief decides when traffic control is needed at such roadside jobs, and the Police Department is the go-to agency to staff them. Asked at the July 21 Board of Selectmen meeting about how the policy plays out in practice, Tree Warden Bruce Pauley said: “The police, they make the rules—what roads have to have traffic control.”

“And it pretty much involves every single road—there are rare exceptions,” he said at the meeting, held in the Training Room of the New Canaan Police Department. “It adds a certain amount of price to this—if this is $29,000 you can expect to pay $5,000 in traffic control. It adds up and it comes out of the tree budget which I am not happy with but it is the way it is.