Government

Town, Eversource To Ink Deal Bringing Natural Gas to New Canaan Starting Next Year

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The town’s highest elected official on Monday night said he’s poised to sign an agreement that will bring natural gas to New Canaan public buildings, businesses and some homes, signaling the introduction in earnest of a widely anticipated energy source following years of stop-and-go efforts. First Selectman Rob Mallozzi and representatives from Eversource unveiled a plan to bring a 4.7 mile “trunk line” up Route 106 from Stamford to serve New Canaan High School, South School, Saxe Middle School, the YMCA and Waveny Care Center, as well as East School, in 2018. After that, Eversource’s program manager for gas expansions, Chris Luca, told members of the Utilities Commission at their regular meeting, the company in 2019 will lay an additional five miles of lines to bring natural gas to residences along the South Avenue corridor, from Farm Road toward the downtown. Additionally, Eversource will offer natural gas to residences where it makes sense along the route to East School—the proposed route calls for a line to run down Harrison and then up Main and along Lakeview to the school. And then in 2020, the natural gas line build-out will come to the business district, Luca said.

Government

Town: ‘New’ Natural Gas Route from Eversource Uses State Road; Re-Paving Back On for Spring Water Lane Neighborhood

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Sidelined last month because the asphalt was to be ripped up to install natural gas lines, the repaving of a set of town roads now is back in play, town officials say, as the utility company unexpectedly is taking a different route into New Canaan. Residents of Spring Water Lane, Adams Lane and Hillcrest Road have waited years to have their roads repaved because they live along a gas line route that Eversource had proposed in the past, First Selectman Rob Mallozzi said. Yet “it now appears that Eversource is going to be coming up state Route 106 and avoiding local roads coming into town” from Stamford, Mallozzi told NewCanaanite.com. “So, unfortunately, we had to pull back on a promised area of paving in town,” he said. The Board of Selectmen last month shifted the would-be project for Spring Water-Adams-Hillcrest to three stretches of Ponus Ridge—a plan that was “met with an incredible amount of disappointment and consternation by the neighbors because, quite frankly, they had been waiting all that time to have their streets paved,” Mallozzi said.

Government

‘A Very Positive First Step’: Utility Co. Reopens Natural Gas Talks with Town, Officials Say

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Town officials said Monday night that the utility company has restarted conversations about bringing natural gas to New Canaan—a three-year-old effort that stalled and finally broke down last summer in a finger-pointing squabble between the parties. Yet Eversource has returned to the town “and said that they would like to present a new proposal and have a new discussion about bringing natural gas into New Canaan,” according to Utilities Commission Chairman Tom Tesluk. “They are very conscious that a lot of discussion took place and went nowhere last time,” Tesluk said at the commission’s regular meeting, held at Town Hall. “I think they’re sincere in bringing a proposal to the town, so we’ll just have to wait and see what they come up with. But there are some obvious advantages to being able to have natural gas in New Canaan and I think it’s safe to say that most of us would welcome it if it can be done efficiently.”

Tesluk said members of the commission and Board of Selectmen met with Eversource officials recently.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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All but one grade involved in the New Canaan Youth Football will send a team this weekend into a championship or semifinal. The program serves third- through eighth-graders. Best of luck to our boys competing for titles:

3rd grade black team
4th grade red team
5th grade red & white teams
6th grade red & black teams
8th grade black & white teams

***

We’re hearing from some local historians that New Canaan’s backing of a Democratic candidate for president this week may have been the first time since 1964 that a Democrat seeking the nation’s highest elected office carried the town (LBJ). ***

Speaking of the election, NCHS ’14 graduate and George Washington University student Chase Williams, son of New Canaan Selectman Nick Williams, appeared in images that went viral in the wee hours of Wednesday morning, after he climbed a tree outside the White House, where a combination of protesters and celebrators had gathered after Republican Donald Trump won the presidential race. Chase, a varsity soccer captain when he was at NCHS, told us that he arrived there and “it was a madhouse” with people screaming and becoming increasingly belligerent.

Government

Town, Utility Company At Odds About Why Natural Gas Talks Broke Down

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Town and utility company officials are at odds about just why talks broke down regarding a long-discussed proposal to bring natural gas into New Canaan. While members of the Utilities Commission and others in New Canaan have long maintained that Eversource failed to deliver on a commitment to bring natural gas here—the upshot of which includes a plan now in place to heat public schools with propane—officials with the Berlin, Conn.-based company said it was town’s decision to abandon plans. “It’s unfortunate that New Canaan town leaders have a different recollection of what happened during our talks to bring natural gas to town,” Tricia Taskey Modifica, Eversource Energy’s media relations manager for Connecticut, told NewCanaanite.com in an email. “We made an offer to First Selectman Rob Mallozzi and the Utilities Commission last year that would have brought natural gas to the schools, YMCA, and Waveny Care Center. Once that was complete, we would have extended the system to bring gas downtown and through the residential neighborhoods nearby.