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Video Surveillance Cameras at Waveny: Parks Officials Call for Detailed Police Recommendation 

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Parks officials said Wednesday night that the first step in determining whether video surveillance cameras should be installed at Waveny is to get a formal, detailed opinion from local police. An online petition with more than 1,400 digital signatures that advocates for the cameras and data on how such security systems benefit the public are “very important pieces” of the discussion, Parks & Recreation Commission Chair Rona Siegel said during the appointed body’s regular meeting. And a “recommendation from law enforcement to the town, presented to Parks and Rec is the correct step,” Siegel said at the meeting. “A clear and concise opinion from law enforcement” that includes recommendations on just where the cameras would go “is what the town needs,” she said at the meeting, held in Town Hall. Other questions such as what local agency or agencies would have access and jurisdiction over video content and how long it would remain before officials taped over it also must be part of the town’s decision, officials said.

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Parks Commissioner: Trash Bin at Waveny To Address Problem of Dumped Dog Waste Bags

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Saying a similarly placed trash receptacle has worked in Irwin Park, officials announced last week that Waveny visitors will have a new bin to dump their used dog poop bags. As it is now, many of those bags end up dumped in the southwest corner of the park, where a trail that runs alongside the Merritt Parkway intersects with Lapham Road, according to Parks & Recreation Commissioner Sally Campbell. “Someone always puts a trash bag up there,” Campbell said during the Commission’s May 8 meeting, held at Town Hall. She referred to a bag that a park visitor ties to a tree to receive the used bags. Campbell said she has spoken to the head of public works about putting a trash bin in Waveny, and that he’s “is in agreement that that’s not a bad idea.”

“It is just one trash can in the park, it is not everywhere, but it is just a natural turn” in Waveny for those carrying the bags, Campbell said.

Government

‘It’s a Pretty Apparent Conflict’: First Selectman Voices Concern About Parks & Rec Commissioner 

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An appointed town official is risking a conflict of interest due to her position on a private nonprofit organization whose work involves the very area of municipal government she’s charged with overseeing, First Selectman Kevin Moynihan said last week. Unknown to Moynihan and without permission, Parks & Recreation Commissioner Sally Campbell last year became vice chairman of the Waveny Park Conservancy, he said during a media briefing. 

“She was there [on the Conservancy] as an ex-officio representative to the town government and she somehow thought it was right to become a legal board member and now she continues to come before her own Commission representing the Conservancy,” Moynihan said during the briefing, held in his office at Town Hall. “I don’t understand why she does that.”

He added: “It’s a pretty apparent conflict to me, and I’ve talked to her about it and I don’t understand why she doesn’t get it.”

Asked about her role on the Conservancy, Campbell told NewCanaanite.com in an email: “I am not sure what Kevin’s concern is. As first selectman he advocated to have town reps on many of the non profits in town, Waveny Conservancy being one of them.” She added that she would discuss the matter with Moynihan.

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Parks Officials Vote 7-1 To Support New Access Road Connecting NCHS, Waveny

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Saying they still need to reach an agreement with district officials about how a proposed new access road linking New Canaan High School to Waveny would be used, members of the Parks & Recreation Commission at their most recent meeting voted 7-1 in favor the concept. The proposed road would run south of the parking lot that sits between Dunning Field and the tennis courts at NCHS, through a grass area toward where the Summer Theatre of New Canaan had its site, and connect to a milled lot alongside the Waveny water towers. By installing parking spaces on either side of the new road, and at the same time expanding “water tower field” parking, New Canaan would gain about 75 new spaces in an area that now requires more of them, with the launch of additional turf fields, officials have said. Briefed on the plan in March, some Parks & Rec commissioners said they worried the new access road would bring unwanted additional traffic to Waveny. Since then, members of the Commission have walked the site and studied the plan in greater detail, and at their April 10 meeting voted to approve the idea, though questions about whether gates on either side of the road would be “locked during the day full-time, open only on weekends, only allowed for teacher parking or student parking” still must be worked out, Chairman Rona Siegel said.

Carl Mason

Parks & Rec Seeks To Improve Platform Tennis Reservation System

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Saying improvements could be made to reservation and waitlist systems, parks officials say they’re trying to figure out how to ensure the platform tennis courts at Waveny are getting full use. As it is, those reserving the “paddle tennis” courts may cancel up to four hours before their scheduled slot—a deadline the town changed from 12 hours at the request of the players themselves, according to Recreation Director Steve Benko. Yet even if an auto-notification system alerted others on a waitlist about a newly available court, it’s difficult to pull together four players on a few hours’ notice, Benko told members of the Parks & Recreation Commission at their most recent meeting. 

“The hardest thing is that paddle is a doubles game, not a singles game,” Benko said during the April 10 meeting, held at Town Hall. “Very few people play singles paddle.”

Commissioner Francesca Segalas said that with the online reservation system now in place, “cancellations and waitlist were two issues that really are not working well,” and that those players who have demonstrated “a cancellation habit” cannot be tracked. 

Commissioner Carl Mason asked what Parks & Rec would seek to do in terms of its policy if it was able to identify “repeat offenders” who tend to cancel at the last minute. Benko said the town’s policy has been that a warning is issued the first time, a three-day penalty (where players cannot make a reservation) is imposed after a second, a week-long penalty after a third offense and “then you are done” if it happens a fourth time.