Board of Selectmen

‘I View This As An Expendable Area’: Future of Kiwanis Park Uncertain

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Months after ridding a town-owned home in Kiwanis Park of its tenants, First Selectman Kevin Moynihan disclosed Tuesday that the structure could be used for New Canaan YMCA summer camp operations under a new public-private partnership. 

The Y has “a very vibrant activity there, and we are in discussions with them about having them take over the house which is now vacated,” Moynihan said during the Board of Selectmen’s regular meeting, held at Town Hall. 

“Also, the YMCA could perhaps accommodate some of these smaller activities to supervise that [with] lifeguards of theirs, so it could become more of a public-private partnership to use the park,” he continued. Addressing parks officials during a presentation of the Recreation Department’s budget, Moynihan added, “We really don’t need to maintain a facility [at Kiwanis]. We are accommodating out-of-towners at the [Waveny] pool, basically to supplement the budget. And we probably don’t need to do that any more because the pool has really become very active. So the discussion is, do we really want to maintain what in my view is an outdated facility or do we want to try to resuscitate it?”

In order to meet a Board of Finance operating budget guideline for municipal departments of -2%, “you have to figure out which activities we cease doing and cut back, and everything can’t be done in one year,” he said.

Government

Parks & Rec: Kiwanis Park ‘Is Not Fully Being Used’

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Attendance at Kiwanis increased by more than 40% last summer and the park potentially could more than cover costs associated with its operation, officials said last week. Kiwanis Park “is not fully being used for what it should be,” according to Parks & Recreation Commission Chair Rona Siegel. “The facility is incredible inside that concession,” Siegel said during the Commission’s regular meeting, held Jan. 8 at Town Hall. “It is restaurant-grade for the summer and spring months.

Government

Officials Seek Workable Site in Kiwanis Park for Proposed Open-Air Ice Rink

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Town officials said Tuesday they’re trying to identify just where in Kiwanis Park would be the best place for a proposed open-air ice rink. 

A leading contender for a seasonal rink site in New Canaan that would be open to the public with an admission charge, Kiwanis is attractive in that it has sufficiently large areas, parking, access to bathrooms, running water and electricity, and structures that could house changing areas, snack bar and skate shop, members of the Parks & Recreation Commission have said. Yet a level area out front of the main pavilion traditionally has been used by a local service organization for a large chunk of the late-November-through-February trial season that Parks & Rec has floated. 

And early cost estimates to level out an area behind the pavilion and install a retaining wall there appear cost-prohibitive, a group of town officials and community volunteers said during a meeting of a Parks & Rec subcommittee. It’s also unclear whether installing the ice rink deeper into the park—on the far side of the swimming hole—would create a sufficiently attractive and workable facility, officials said during the Parks & Rec skating subcommittee meeting. While excavation, fill, retaining wall construction and other costs would push the total expense for an ice rink located between the rear of the pavilion and swimming hole to an estimated $200,000 to $250,000, creating a facility out front of the building, where the Exchange Club of New Canaan in past years has set up its approximately month-long Christmas tree sale would be far less money, official said. Rona Siegel, chair of Parks & Rec, asked whether the club had ever looked at setting up its sale in the Waveny Pool parking lot instead. 

“It’s ideal,” Siegel said at the meeting, held in a conference room at Town Hall.

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Rec Director Defends Tennis Programs at Mead Park

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During a capital budget discussion that grew testy at times, the head of the New Canaan Recreation Department last week defended reinvigorated town-run tennis programs at Mead Park. Responding to one Parks & Recreation Commission member’s assertion that the clay courts at Mead continue to go largely under-used, Steve Benko said, “We are building our program.”

“If you want to kill my program, then kill it,” Benko told Commissioner Sally Campbell during the appointed body’s Nov. 13 meeting, held at Lapham Community Center. “But my program came back. My tennis grew by almost 60% from last year.”

The comments came as the Commission reviewed the Recreation and Parks Departments’ proposed spending plans for fiscal year 2021.

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‘It Takes a Village’: Parks & Rec Chair Spotlights Volunteer Efforts

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The chair of the Parks and Recreation Commission at the appointed body’s most recent meeting voiced appreciation for six local volunteer efforts in New Canaan. Rona Siegel in providing an update during the Commission’s Oct. 16 meeting credited individual residents and nonprofit organizations that have enhanced or are expected to improve areas of public parks here in various ways. “I think it takes a village,” Siegel said at the meeting, held at Lapham Community Center. “And as much as there are things that are bumps in the road, there are a lot of people that make stuff happen in New Canaan.”

She named: the Waveny Park Conservancy for its work in and around the pond at the foot of the sledding hill; New Canaan High School graduate Celia Sokolowski, who installed “bat houses” at local parks as part of her Girl Scout Gold Award project; NCHS senior Henry Pohle, who for his Eagle Scout project installed two new benches dedicated to local veterans at the memorial Gold Star Walk in Mead Park; and Allyson Mahoney and Monica Capela, who led the Friends of Mead Park Playground’s efforts, in conjunction with the town, to get new equipment and a poured-in-place rubberized surface there.