Government

Officials: Trash-Collecting Company Non-Responsive To Inquiries Regarding High Rates

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Town officials said Tuesday that they’ve been unable to reach a Stamford-based garbage and recycling collection company for a reason why New Canaan is paying about 30% more than neighboring Wilton for a similar service, and will seek a new contractor. 

The town pays City Carting about $85 per ton for recycling services, compared to Wilton’s rate of $65 per ton, according to Department of Public Works Assistant Superintendent of Solid Waste Don Smith. 

“I can’t get ahold of nobody,” Smith told the Board of Selectmen when asked whether City Carting had justified the $20 difference. “I have sent emails, phone calls and text messages and nobody has gotten back to me since our last time we had this [discussion] in November.”

The comments can as the Board approved payment of about $64,000 to City Carting for invoices racked up the past three months. The town since July 1 has been using the company without a contract. 

Smith told the selectmen during their regular meeting at Town Hall that a request for proposals will go out next week. “I’m sending it to all three major companies in the area and hopefully someone else will just respond and go after it,” Smith said. The two other companies are located in Shelton and Bridgeport, he said.

Government

Budget Cuts: Town To Reduce Funding for Landscaping Work Around Several Public Buildings

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Town officials are looking to cut back on landscaping work around a handful of public buildings, including Vine Cottage, Powerhouse Theater, Carriage Barn Arts Center, Saxe Middle School and New Canaan High School. The proposed budget for next fiscal year removes about $15,000 paid annually to outside contractors in recent years for more frequent weeding and mulching that the Parks & Recreation Commission had pushed for, including during “spring cleanups.”

John Howe, parks superintendent in the Department of Public Works, told members of the Commission during their Jan. 8 meeting, “The hard part I see is that we have been able to have these buildings look great throughout the year.”

“And we are kind of going backwards,” he said at the meeting, held in Town Hall. “Are we in better shape now than we were five years ago? Yes, by a long shot.”

The cutbacks come as the Board of Finance guides municipal departments to reduce operating costs by 2%.

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Elm Street Poised To Regain Lost Parking Spaces by Playhouse

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Advised that a 25-foot buffer doesn’t apply to the area because it’s not an “intersection” under the state’s definition, town officials say they plan to re-stripe parking spaces on either side of the crosswalk in front of The Playhouse on Elm Street. Public Works Director Tiger Mann said plans include a “bump-out” to prevent vehicles from parking too close to the crosswalk and “protect pedestrians.”

“So we actually kind of kill two birds with one,” Mann said during a Jan. 9 meeting of the Selectmen’s Advisory Committee on Buildings and Infrastructure, held at Town Hall. “It’s not actually just putting the parking spaces back.”

It wasn’t immediately clear just how many spaces New Canaan will regain once the plans are approved by the Police Commission. 

The town had lost a total of 13 spaces in the summer of 2018 after a town resident put New Canaan on formal notice about its noncompliance with a 1949 state law that prohibits parking within 25 feet of a marked crosswalk at an intersection. After repaving Elm Street, which has four crosswalks between Main and Park, the town redrew parking spaces in observance of the law.

Government

Re-Digging Up Roads: Water Main Won’t Serve New Canaan

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New Canaan won’t benefit from the 36-inch main line that likely will see a stretch of Main Street dug up for the third time starting this year or next, officials say. The water company’s transmission line is designed to move water from Bridgeport’s system to Greenwich, according to First Selectman Kevin Moynihan. “Believe it or not, Greenwich actually contracts to sell their water to Westchester towns, and when we had the drought and we had that temporary pipeline, they had to move water which is available in Bridgeport reservoirs over to Greenwich,” Moynihan said during Tuesday’s Board of Selectmen meeting, held at Town Hall. “this is a permanent fix for that, I guess.”

The comments came during an update on general matters before the town. 

Public Works Director Tiger Mann had discussed the future project during a meeting last month. The line is coming from Wilton and will run through New Canaan to Stamford, Mann said. 

Most of the route will stick to state roads, but it will come off of Route 106 near East School before hooking back up with Route 124/South Avenue near Waveny, according to Mann.

George Blauvelt

Re-Digging Up Roads: Water Company Plans To Install New Main Line in New Canaan

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The water company plans to install a main line in New Canaan, a project that likely will affect roads recently dug up for the natural gas expansion, officials say. Aquarion’s planned 36-inch water main is a transmission line that’s designed to address the company’s “resiliency problem,” according to Public Works Director Tiger Mann. “So that’s going to come from Wilton and run its way through to the Waveny tower, to the water tower,” Mann said during a Dec. 11 meeting of the Selectmen’s Advisory Committee on Buildings and Infrastructure, held at Town Hall. 

“That is primarily going to be on state roads, until it gets to Little Brook, and then they want to come down Little Brook, past the school, down Lakeview, down Millport, down Main, down Farm, get into Waveny Park. So everything that is already being dug up is going to get re-dug for the 36-inch line.”

The comments came during an update on upcoming major capital projects. 

The line installation will be a three-year project and it’s now in the planning phase, Mann said.