Town To Fund Much-Needed Dredging of Pond at New Canaan Nature Center

A frequently visited pond at the New Canaan Nature Center is in serious need of dredging, and the town is planning to partner with the nonprofit organization on the project.

The Board of Selectmen on Tuesday approved a $14,600 contract with a local company to survey an approximately 26-acre parcel at the Nature Center in preparation for the dredge, with the organization providing half of the funding. 

“The pond is getting to the point where Mill and Mead were at, where eventually we are going to have a change in designation from a pond to a wetland,” Public Works Director Tiger Mann told the selectmen at their regular meeting, held at Town Hall and via videoconference. “So we need to continue to act and the move forward.”
First Selectman Kevin Moynihan and Selectmen Kathleen Corbet and Nick Williams voted 3-0 in favor of the contract with New Canaan-based RKW Land Surveying.

The firm held its price from last year, Mann said.

The Nature Center is looking to do additional work in the area, including to its boardwalks, Mann said.

The selectmen asked how much the dredge itself would cost (could be about $150,000, based on a comparison to other dredges, though the figure will not be known until the design work is done), whether the town would fund the dredging work (yes), whether the project qualifies for American Rescue Plan Act funding (perhaps but the physical dredging is still to come) and whether the town’s only funding responsibility amid all of the Nature Center’s work is for the pond dredging (yes).

“They [the Nature Center] have funded in the past their upgrades, their trail work or boardwalk work—they have funded completely on their own,” Mann said. “This is a necessary step for them and us ,and so it made sense to combine forces and split the costs.”

The pond in question is identified on this Nature Center map as the “Kiwanis Pond.”