Around Town

NewCanaanite.com Introduces Editorial Advisory

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As owner and editor of NewCanaanite.com, I’m thrilled to announce that we’ve created the news site’s first editorial advisory. Four longtime residents have agreed to serve on it: Laura Budd, Julia Stewart, Rob Mallozzi and Doug Zumbach. In this capacity, they’ll review and provide feedback on all opinion pieces that appear on NewCanaanite.com under my byline or the generic site byline, prior to publication, as well as recommend topics that we should be covering for editorials and news stories, and responding to a wide range of questions from me regarding New Canaanite’s tone, voice, coverage plan and guidelines. The need for an editorial advisory arose out of a decision to publish endorsement letters prior to the 2017 local elections, and my own feeling that New Canaanite ought to have a standing group of trusted readers/advisors to review such opinion pieces before they’re made public. While serving on the editorial advisory does not necessarily mean that each member will agree with every opinion piece, it does mean that each such post will get full vetting before them.

Around Town

Fran Schneidau, 79, Longtime New Canaan Resident and CT Bureau Chief of WCBS 880

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Fran Schneidau, a longtime New Canaan resident known to generations of radio listeners as the Connecticut bureau chief of WCBS 880, died Tuesday night, according to CBS New York. She was 79. An iconic radio voice and legend among news reporters in the state, Schneidau worked at WCBS Newsradio for four decades, according to her LinkedIn profile. Former New Canaan First Selectman Rob Mallozzi said he knew Schneidau’s voice from growing up in the area and got to know her on a professional level as selectman, working in emergency management with the Emergency Operations Center, and then in the town’s highest elected office. “Just a real warm, caring professional,” Mallozzi told NewCanaanite.com.

Around Town

Did You Hear … ?

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Motor vehicle accidents in New Canaan are down 6 percent year-over-year, the police chief reported Wednesday night, while drunk-driving arrests are down to 27 year-to-date in 2017, from 42 at the same time last year. Larcenies from vehicles are up, from 32 at this time last year to 42 in 2017, Chief Leon Krolikowski reported to members of the Police Commission, while stolen vehicles have increased from six to 13, and youth parties have doubled year-to-date, from four to eight. ***

Rob Mallozzi, for six years the first selectman of New Canaan, won convincingly in his latest contest: He was voted in unanimously as an active firefighter with the New Canaan Fire Co. Mallozzi had removed himself from that role upon assuming the town’s highest elected office in 2011. ***

The town on Dc.

Business

Former New Canaan First Selectman Rob Mallozzi Joins Bankwell

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Days after leaving office, New Canaan’s popular former first selectman announced that he’ll continue to work in town after accepting a position with one of its most prominent and community-oriented local businesses. Rob Mallozzi, who served in New Canaan’s top elected office for six years, is starting a job with Bankwell as a senior vice president and director of business development. “I am as excited as can be to be joining the team at Bankwell,” Mallozzi told NewCanaanite.com. “I’ve known many of the folks there for a number of years and have also witnessed all they have done in New Canaan during my years as first selectman—they are a true community asset. I know they put that same emphasis in the other towns they are in and I look forward to communicating that sense of responsibility and partnership to the many people I’ll be interfacing with.”

He added: “I could not choose a better place to call home than Bankwell and look forward to what lies ahead for me and for the bank.”

After very narrowly losing his party’s backing for a fourth term at a caucus in July, Mallozzi to the surprise of many declined to pursue a primary runoff versus his opponent.

Around Town

‘No One Is Forgotten’: Officials Unveil Plaques Honoring Korean, Vietnam, Gulf Wars and War on Terror Veterans at Town Hall

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During the Vietnam War, Peter Langenus had what he recalled on Saturday morning as “the honor and privilege” of commanding a rifle company. The Third Battalion, Seventh Infantry, 199th Light Infantry Brigade was, the New Canaan man said, “200 18- and 19-year-old kids with rifles, machine guns and grenades.”

“They are the soldiers that carry the burden,” Langenus, commander of VFW Post 653, told about 100 residents gathered in the new northern entrance to Town Hall for a special dedication following New Canaan’s annual Veterans Day ceremony at God’s Acre. “The grunts. The war fighters. The gunslingers.