Government

New Canaan Police Pursue Extensive Renovation of Department Headquarters

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A proposal to renovate the New Canaan Police Headquarters building may be executed in the near future, officials say. A renovation has been listed on New Canaan’s 5-year capital plan for years—right now a $2 million item is earmarked for fiscal year 2021 (see page 62 here)—but never launched. “We may be close to getting a good plan in place and working toward renovation,” Police Chief Leon Krolikowski said at the July 25 meeting of the Police Commission, held at the headquarters building. The first and second floors of the building have not received any serious upgrades since 1981, according to the chief. “It is sorely in need of a renovation,” Krolikowski said.

Business

Officials Wary of Proposal for Nonprofit, Community Organizations To Use ‘Pop Up Park’ for Sales

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Town officials on Tuesday night voiced objections to a proposal that nonprofit and community organizations be allowed to sell fundraiser tickets or items such as Girl Scout cookies in the Pop Up Park downtown, saying the popular pedestrian area should remain entirely solicitation-free. When the cordoned-off park launched five years ago, New Canaan’s traffic authority specified that nothing be sold there “mostly because we did not want to have in any way reactions by the merchants that the Pop Up Park would compete with them,” according to Police Commission member Sperry DeCew. “I am not particularly happy about this [idea],” DeCew said at the group’s regular meeting, held at the New Canaan Police Department. “I do not particularly want people in there being solicited by anybody to do anything—Lobsterfest or Girl Scout cookies. I think it’s inappropriate and there should be no solicitation whatsoever.”

DeCew and fellow Commissioner Paul Foley—together with Chairman Stuart Sawabini, who participated in the meeting on speakerphone—referred to a draft set of “sales guidelines” from the volunteer committee that organizes the Pop Up Park.

News

Newest New Canaan Police Officer Sworn In; Tam Receives ‘Officer of the Year Award’; 8 Officers, 3 Civilians Honored

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The New Canaan Police Department on Tuesday recognized eight officers and three civilians for outstanding service to the community during a ceremony that also saw the agency’s newest member sworn in by the town clerk. In addressing Nicole Vartuli, a Stamford native and Westhill High School graduate who is poised for training at the Connecticut Police Academy this year with an expectation that she will undergo field training with NCPD through the early part of 2018, Chief Leon Krolikowski said that “badge you were just issued represents public trust.”

“The public willingly puts this work in your hands and trusts that you will take care of them in the proper manner,” Krolikowski said moments after Vartuli had been sworn in by Town Clerk Claudia Weber. “They do not want this responsibility for themselves. My charge to you today is to do just that: Get it right. We have all heard about the stories of officers who have gotten it wrong.

Government

‘I Fear for My Life’: Silvermine Residents Seek More Substantial Changes To Slow Motor Vehicle Traffic in Neighborhood

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Though officials two months ago lowered the speed limit on Silvermine Road from 30 to 25 mph, motor vehicle traffic still whizzes through the neighborhood and its increasingly popular, pedestrian-oriented commercial area, residents said last week. Describing Silvermine as unique in that it has its own market, arts center and soon-to-reopen inn and restaurant, residents told members of the Police Commission at their regular meeting that more must be done in order to reduce the speed of cars and trucks to safe levels. Mark Thorsheim said that reducing the speed limit hasn’t changed the behavior of drivers. “There need to be physical infrastructure changes beyond the 25 mph,” he told members of the Police Commission at their June 14 meeting, held in the New Canaan Police Department’s training room. “Silvermine, the road, the neighborhood is different than other roads.

News

‘A Major Setback’: New Canaan Officials Withdraw Application for Monopole in Stamford To Improve Public Safety Radio Coverage

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Facing opposition from neighborhood residents, town officials said Wednesday that they’re withdrawing an application to erect a tower just over the Stamford border that had been designed to improve emergency radio communications in northwestern New Canaan. The decision followed conversations that included the highest elected officials of both municipalities and a city representative of the north Stamford residents who live near a proposed monopole on Aquarion property, according to New Canaan Police Commission Chairman Stuart Sawabini. The upshot was that “it would be extremely unlikely that the city of Stamford would ever approve an antenna” on the corner of Reservoir Lane and Laurel Road (see map below), Sawabini said during a regular meeting of the Police Commission. The development “was a major setback, sadly,” Sawabini said at the meeting, held in the training room at the New Canaan Police Department. “We have other locations that we had considered and rejected, but that we are reopening for reconsideration.