Around Town

Former Resident Returns 60-Year-Old Plant to Bristow Park

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Most seven-year-old boys like to spend their days inside playing video games; most like to race toy cars and look at picture books. Yet, that wasn’t Ken Booth. While most of his peers were watching superhero TV shows, Booth was becoming somewhat of nature’s “Robin Hood.”

Booth, who graduated from New Canaan High School in 1976, grew up across the street from Bristow Park and spent his childhood traversing the sanctuary’s beauty. He’d go with his family and friends into the park to play games and explore the vegetation. During these adventures, young Booth developed a fascination for plants, especially a flowering plant called a Jack-in-the-Pulpit.

Around Town

Robin Bates-Mason Hired as Executive Director of the New Canaan Land Trust

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One of New Canaan’s most venerable nonprofit organizations has hired a highly respected town resident with a broad range of work and community volunteer experience as its new executive director. Robin Bates-Mason will assume the position of director of the New Canaan Land Trust in mid-June, according to a press release issued by the organization. “Robin brings to the role a deep commitment to community engagement and environmental stewardship, along with experience in nonprofit leadership,” the press release said. “A 25 year resident of New Canaan, along with her husband Carl and two sons, Robin is well known for her service on local boards and initiatives that promote sustainability and civic involvement.”

She is co-founder and president of Planet New Canaan and past co-president and board member of the New Canaan Beautification League who served one term on the Town Council from 2019 to 2023 and currently serves as chair of the Conservation Commission. Bates-Mason also works as volunteer and events manager for Staying Put in New Canaan, from which she will “thoughtfully transition” in these intervening weeks, the press release said

“I’m honored to join the New Canaan Land Trust and am excited to build on the strong foundation that’s been laid by past leaders, volunteers, and supporters,” Bates-Mason said in the release.

Around Town

DPW: Swap Shop at Transfer Station ‘A Successful Program’

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A public-private partnership at the Transfer Station is saving the town money, officials say. The Swap Shop, organized and operated by Planet New Canaan with support from the Department of Public Works, has helped New Canaan become more green-friendly by keeping many items out of the municipal waste stream. That also has helped reduce the town’s bill for disposing of waste, according to Public Works Director Tiger Mann. “We feel this is a successful program,” Mann said during the May 21 Board of Selectmen meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference. “I still think it’s saving money.”

Although some donated Swap Shop items ultimately become garbage because they’re not claimed, “it’s less than what we would have received having not had the Swap Shop,” Mann said.

Around Town

Quiet Heroes of New Canaan: Michele Ayoub

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Michele Ayoub has been donating Mother’s Day tulips to Staying Put in New Canaan members since the start of the pandemic, according to the popular nonprofit organization. A mom who appreciated the support she received from neighbors during her pregnancy and baby-rearing, Ayoub began growing the flowers as Mother’s Day gifts for those same neighbors, as well as family and friends, and even threw a “tulip party,” according to Gina Blum, executive director of Staying Put. 

The annual yield is now up to some 3,000 to 4,000 tulips “that she plants every year and during COVID she did not have the party, so she found Staying Put in New Canaan and other organizations who deliver them to seniors, and she continued with us each year,” Blum said by way of nominating Ayoub for the “Quiet Heroes” series. Founded in 2008, Staying Put in New Canaan helps local seniors live independent, active and engaged lives as they grow older. (The organization’s “Summer Soirée” will be held from 5 to 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 6 at Waveny House—details and tickets here.)

According to Robin Bates-Mason, Staying Put’s manager of events and volunteers, the organization gets calls from its members thankful for the flowers. “They’re so appreciative of it and how pretty and unique they [the tulips] are,” Bates-Mason said.