Around Town

‘Some Really Great Candidates’: Search for Next Head of New Canaan Community Foundation Is Well Underway

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In just a few weeks, New Canaan’s major local philanthropic organization and host to several unique human services-related programs has received a very strong response in its search for a new president and CEO. Since Cynthia Gorey stepped down June 30 as head of the New Canaan Community Foundation, the nonprofit organization has interviewed four candidates for the important position, including people who live locally and across the nation, according to Diane Hanauer, a past board member who is leading the search committee. NCCF has “made huge inroads over the last several years since our merger with United Way—we really feel like we are well-positioned in town to go to the next level and we’re for leader who can take us there,” Hanauer told NewCanaanite.com. “The next level of fundraising, next level of partnership in the community, next level of education and information-sharing. Cynthia did a great job bringing us where we are—literally from starting with three cardboard boxes in the trunk of a car—to where we are today, and we are ready.”

Those who are interested in the position—a full description can be found here—should contact the search committee as soon as possible at careers@newcanaancf.org.

Around Town

‘A Fairly Amazing Run’: Cynthia Gorey To Leave New Canaan Community Foundation After 14 Years

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Though it isn’t measurable by any single data point, Cynthia Gorey’s influence in leading the New Canaan Community Foundation for 14-plus years as its executive director, later president and CEO, may be sketched in terms of numbers. NCCF was 25 years old when the organization’s Board of Directors hired Gorey as its first full-time employee, in 2002, and at the time the nonprofit oversaw about $3 million in assets in three or four separate funds, according to current board President Leo Karl III. Today, NCCF controls a little more than $16 million, and for the last several years it’s distributed more than $1 million in annual grants, Karl said. NCCF also now counts nearly 40 separate funds—they vary from board-directed to donor-advised or agency funds set aside for nonprofits’ capital or long-term endowments—and they’re pooled and invested together. In total, NCCF in Gorey’s tenure has distributed more than $11 million—touching people’s lives with a breadth and depth that defies calculation.

News

NCCF, Town Officials Collaborate on New Firefighter Safety Initiative

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Wood Truss test Burn
This video was created to help show firefighters the dangers of wood truss roof assemblies when they are exposed to fire. The video contains excerpts of tests burns that were conducted on a wood truss assembly and also a wood “stick built” roof assembly. With the help of one prominent local nonprofit organization, town officials are launching a new initiative that’s designed to supply more information to firefighters arriving on the scene of a structure fire in order to help ensure their safety. Soon, when building permit applications come into the town, a note will be made if the new structure is using what’s known as “lightweight truss construction”—an efficient and increasingly common framework that relies on geometry for strength rather than mass. A trusted product for homebuilding, truss construction also has far a smaller surface area than typical framed construction, “so when it’s exposed to very high heat, such as in a fire, it fails far more quickly than dimensional lumber,” according to New Canaan firefighter John Aniello.

Around Town

New Canaanites Help Drive ‘Fairfield County Hospice House’ Project

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STAMFORD—New Canaan’s Julia Portale stood on the grass verge just off of this residential road in Stamford on Tuesday afternoon, the Douglas fir frame of a new structure rising on the 1.3-acre lot behind her. Known in New Canaan as a longtime Girl Scouts leader who taught Sunday School at the Congregational Church and now serves on the New Canaan Land Trust’s board of directors, Portale holds master’s degrees (from Yale) in both public health and business administration. For the last few years, she’s been running a home care hospice program in Fairfield—and, next year if all goes as Portale and a host of advocates for this project off of the Merritt Parkway’s Exit 33 are planning, she’ll be running a new type of hospice program that will serve New Canaan and other area families. “This is the setting that is the next best thing to home for people who are dying and who do not need intensive care, do not need facility-level care and can’t stay at home,” Portale said from the future site of Fairfield County Hospice House (see rendering at right), where she will serve as executive director. “If patients cannot stay at home, it is an opportunity for them to be in a home environment, a house that allows family to come in and spend quality time with loved ones in a home setting.”

Founded and governed by a nonprofit organization that’s been actively fundraising, site-seeking and otherwise galvanizing support for four years, Fairfield County Hospice House is expected to meet a pressing need that affects scores of area families.