Around Town

Q&A: Composting Talk To Be Held Thursday at New Canaan Library

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New Canaan Library, Planet New Canaan and the Conservation Commission are co-sponsoring a talk about composting on Thursday. Registration is open for ‘Anyone Can Compost: Approaches to Home Composting that Work for You,’ to be held at 6 p.m. on June 15 in the Jim & Dede Bartlett Auditorium at the library. It features Master Gardener and Composter Alice Ely, garden education chair at Wakeman Town Farm, one of the organizers of Westport’s Pollinator Pathway, a UConn Advanced Master Gardener and a UConn Master Composter. Composting is widely practiced in New Canaan. According to data supplied by the Department of Public Works, the total food scrap collection weight at the transfer station (in pounds) for the five weeks starting May 3 are: 1,110, 1,420, 980, 1,040 and 1,150.

Around Town

‘Stuff Has Been Moving’: New Canaan Swap Shop Officially Launches at Transfer Station

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The organizers of the New Canaan Swap Shop say a name like ‘Take It or Leave It’ may have fit the facility better, since the Transfer Station passholders who can use it are free to either drop off items as donations, pick up free stuff or both. But the “Swap Shop” name has stuck and, since an official opening last week that followed a soft launch around Thanksgiving, “stuff has been moving,” according to Robin Bates Mason, president of Planet New Canaan. “Sometimes when stuff comes in, it goes out right away,” Bates Mason said on Wednesday morning as she and fellow volunteers arranged items for the Swap Shop’s operating hours of 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Thursday through Saturday. “We had someone bring in a big bag of PlayStation games. One guy brought in a year-old flatscreen TV and literally 20 minutes later it was out the door.

Around Town

‘Something Small Can Create Something Bigger’: New Canaan Duo Launches Food Waste Recovery Program

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Mariana Ferreria, a recent New Canaan High School graduate who earned a bachelor’s degree this year from Boston College, had been looking last winter for “a side passion project” before going to Spain later this summer as a Fullbright scholar. Ferreira approached Robin Bates Mason of Planet New Canaan, who connected her with 2022 NCHS graduate izzy Kaufman. Kaufman had already launched a composting program at Greenology, where she worked. “I had Izzy explain what she did at Greenology and I was like, ‘That’s crazy because I was thinking of doing the exact same thing for other restaurants in town,’ ” Ferreira recalled. “So we decided it was perfect partnership and from there we started designing what ‘NC FWRD’ is now.”
Short for “New Canaan Food Waste Recovery & Diversion,” NC FWRD is pilot program designed to fully fund and support restaurants that are interested in diverting their food waste.

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Podcast: ‘Swap Shop’ Coming to the Transfer Station This Summer

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This week on 0684-Radi0, our free podcast (subscribe here in the iTunes Store), we share some exciting news from New Canaan’s public works director, Tiger Mann, about a long-planned “swap shop” coming to the New Canaan Transfer Station. The swap shop could launch as early as May or June, Mann said, in partnership with Planet New Canaan. Those interested in learning more about volunteering at the future New Canaan swap shop should email planetnewcanaan@gmail.com. Here are recent episodes of 0684-Radi0: