Board of Selectmen

Selectmen Approve $9,000 Contract for New Furniture at Senior Center

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Town officials last week approved an approximately $9,000 contract with a Wallingford-based for new furniture at the local senior center. The Board of Selectmen voted 3-0 in favor of the $9,166.10 contract for new chairs and tables from INSALCO Corporation. 

Recreation Director Steve Benko said the chairs in the dining area at Lapham Community Center are “have seen thousands of hours of use” and that the laminate on the tabletops has worn off in spots. The frames of the chairs in place now are OK “but the fabric seats are all stained” and unusable,” Benko told the selectmen at their regular meeting, held in Town Hall. First Selectman Kevin Moynihan and Selectmen Kit Devereaux and Nick Williams voted for the contract. The selectmen asked Benko how old the existing furniture is (10 to 20 years) and what the town intends to do with it (get rid of it).

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Officials: Fire System at Lapham Community Center Has Failed

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The fire system at Lapham Community Center has failed and must be replaced on an emergency basis, town officials said this week. The system was original to the 1915-built building and only the panels had been upgraded during an original renovation in 1996, according to Penny Young, co-chair of the Town Council’s Infrastructure and Utilities Committee. “They don’t give any signals,” Young said during an Oct. 15 Committee meeting, held at Town Hall. “So they are working on the replacement of that.

Government

‘The Town Needs To Invest a Little More’: Officials Call for More Funds to Maintain Public Parks’ Grounds

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More maintenance is needed in New Canaan’s parks, particularly in landscaping the areas immediately around public buildings, and the officials in charge of them say they’ll seek more money in the upcoming budget season to care properly for the cherished properties. The Parks Department doesn’t have the funds needed “to adequately maintain the parks,” Sally Campbell, chairman of the Park & Recreation Commission, told members of the Town Council at their Nov. 16 meeting. “I just still can’t believe the conditions of the landscaping around our town buildings and around our beautiful town assets,” Campbell said at the meeting, held in Town Hall. “And we are fortunate that [Parks Superintendent] John Howe does an amazing job maintaining the athletic fields and maintaining our baseball diamonds—and those are kind of easier to maintain—but to maintain the landscaping around Lapham [Community Center], or in Irwin Park where the weeds are just all over the place or the town buildings, we just need more money.”

The comments came during a pre-budget season review of parks and recreation before the Town Council, the final funding body to sign off on New Canaan’s spending plan each year.

Government

Residents Seek Permission To Build Bocce Courts at Lapham

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Parks officials are weighing a request brought forward by two New Canaan residents who are seeking permission to create bocce courts behind the Lapham Community Center at Waveny. Edged by planks of wood, an approximately 10-by-60-foot “stone dust bocce court” would be paid for, built and installed entirely by John Buzzeo, who brought the proposal forward with fellow New Canaanite and Dunkin Donuts morning crew regular Len Paglialunga, according to Recreation Director Steve Benko. “He would build it at no cost to the town,” Benko told the Park & Recreation Commission at its regular monthly meeting, held in the Douglass Room at Lapham Community Center. Buzzeo, a career builder, originally had thought about the area by Gamble Field at Mead Park where the horseshoe pits used to be, but found it likely would be too soggy to use, Benko said. An area between the gazebo behind the community center and the main building itself could be a good location, Benko said.

Government

Carriage Barn Gets a New Roof; Lapham Next, Waveny House on Horizon

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Contractors are nearly finished re-roofing the 1895-built Carriage Barn at Waveny and soon will begin replacing the old slate roofing at Lapham Community Center, officials say. The town projects both are being paid out of the fiscal year 2015 capital budget, with the Carriage Barn job pegged at $225,000 and Lapham at $340,000 (see page 39 of the adopted budget here). The Lapham roof sections in need of replacement will get the same slate as the original, with identical colors and design, according to Bill Oestmann, superintendent of buildings with the New Canaan Department of Public Works. With a bid opening Thursday, the process of getting major capital repairs done at Waveny House also will begin, Oestmann said. The town for the current fiscal year approved $50,000 for an engineering and architectural renovation plan at the cherished town-owned structure.