Town Council - Regular Meeting

Okay. Will all rise for the pledge. Zach, can you lead us in the pledge? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. And to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. A moment of silence for the men and women in the armed forces, our first responders, our veterans, those fighting the good fight in Ukraine, and those suffering from the military conflict in the Middle East. Thank you. And if we could do the American Creed, Katie?

Yep. This is America's Creed by William Tyler Page. I believe in United States of America as a government of the people, by the people, for the people, whose just powers are derived from the consent of the governed, a democracy in a republic, a sovereign nation of many sovereign states, a perfect union, one and inseparable, established upon those principles of freedom, equality, justice, and humanity, for which American patriots sacrificed their lives and fortunes. I therefore believe it is my duty to my country to love it,

to support its constitution, to obey its laws, to respect its flag, and to defend it against all enemies. Thank you. Is Tom on I don't think he's on yet. Who's the one who's coming up now? I am. Yes. We have five signed up, starting with Irene. Hello. The name and address or Name, address, and you have 5 minutes. That's okay. Irene Srubailo, 205 Pumpkin Hill Road. Uh it's I'm saddened to see Mr. Esposito is not with us today. Oh well, maybe next time. I understand that the Republican Town Council is in the process of setting up a high school Turning Point chapter in New Milford. This initiative isn't born of the students. They're being recruited by your RTC. For those who may not know, Turning Point is on. For those who may not know, Turning Point USA is a right-wing nonprofit with the stated mission to quote, "Identify, educate, train, and organize students to promote the principles of freedom, free markets, and limited government." On the surface, that doesn't sound bad. But, um I'll ask you, any of you, to approach a teenager in New Milford and ask them to define free market and describe the pros and cons of such a system, not just one side. The high school already has a Republican club and a Democratic club. How is Turning Point different? Turning Point was founded by the late Charlie Kirk, who you've all probably heard of. You may remember him for his views on race. I'm not going to repeat that stuff. Misogyny, don't get me started. LGBTQ rights, he said things like gay people should be stoned to death. Islamophobia, Muslims should only come to only come to America to to destabilize Western civilization. His

version of side His version of science, hydro- hydroxychloroquine cures COVID and fossil fuels don't cause climate change. Mind you, he was a high school graduate. Elder abuse, spoiler alert, he's okay with it. And most ironically, his staunch support to bear arms, the quote is, "Gun deaths are acceptable in order to have the Second Amendment." This is the figurehead your high schoolers will be emulating. Turning Point maintains a professor professor watchlist. It claims that the purpose of the watchlist is to identify professors who discriminate against conservative students and advance leftist propaganda in the classroom. Researchers have found there's no rampant left-wing bias in any public school teachers indoctrinating students into hating the country. Many entries on the professor watchlist concern faculty social media posts or scholarly publications. In a number of instances, uh listings have led to campaigns of online harassment against faculty members. This can be happening on your high school level. Like it's not hard enough to find high school teachers. TP also promotes a school board watchlist and has launched a private school network in response to the woke curriculum in public schools. Good luck finding a school board. To think that the RTC not only is supportive of this, but is instrument instrumental in forming uh TP Jungvolk in New Milford is damaging to the town, traumatizing to LGBTQ, black, and Muslim citizens, and it is against everything that New Milford should stand for. This is not who we are. We're better than this. We just said the Creed, and one of the lines was about humanity. Should we be crossing that part out? I mean, we have many RTC members here,

and I know you guys are better than this, and we need to do better, New Milford. Thank you. Thank you. [applause] Next, Jackie Eaton. Name, address, Hi, Jackie Eaton, Redwood Lane, New Milford. I just ran here from work, so I'm a little bit uh disheveled. [gasps]

So, um and it's been very busy at work. But anyway, I'd like to say First, I'd like to thank the New Milford police, especially uh Lieutenant Rellstab, the Parks Department, and the mayor for their assistance with no kings. It was a safe, peaceful, and successful demonstration, and we are very grateful for that. Also want to thank Lieutenant Rellstab and the mayor, who um she's going to set up a uh Zoom meeting with me and a couple of the folks from MAC Local to per my our request to learn more about the Connecticut Police Accountability Law. Um and so uh that's in the works. So, thank you very much for um answering that request. Um and I'd also like to acknowledge all the time and effort into the budget process from the different boards and commissions, and I'm grateful for those who volunteer for our town. I don't mind that our taxes are going up as long as our services, education, and quality of life go up with them. However, I don't love the fuzzy messaging that implies we aren't spending more. We are spending more, and our taxes are going up. Um but, like I said, if our services and quality of life go up, then I'm all for it. Um I do believe that as we budget, though, we should I don't believe we should put the DPW on an aquifer. I definitely um I I feel like we need to find a different place and and budget it and find the right place to do that that is not near our water um our water systems and our aquifer. Um so anyway, back to other things. There may be um new numbers since July 2025 Connecticut Insider piece on how how much each Connecticut school district could lose as Trump withholds funds, but they reported back then that Trump

was withholding about $50 million from state education funds, and that New Milford would lose 200,000 in education funding. I haven't seen our Republican State Senator Harding or State Representative Buckbee fighting back for our education funding, and I'm wondering, does the town leadership have the will to fight back against Trump's cuts and policies and to work with our legislators to see what what money we can get back from the state, and just to fight back from all of his cuts. Um and honestly, this is going to be a this is going to be a little bit harsh, so excuse me in advance, but it's from my heart. It is really difficult for me to trust any Republican leadership this day these days. Um it's not the Republican Party that it used to be. Um I was hoping that at least one elected Republican official in this town would speak up against the lies and corruption coming out of Washington. That one Republican would speak out for our kids, that this is not normal, that is not what our country stands for. Our democracy is in peril. But there's not a peep. There's not a word. There is silence from the Republicans at every level of government. Silence is compliance. I hear the Republicans talking about patriotism and it's the 250th anniversary of America and celebrations are underway. I know what I'm celebrating. I'm celebrating the principles that this country were founded on. The bravery, the resistance, the democracy, the freedom, the equality. But what is happening in America under Trump is not that. We are leaning toward authoritarianism. And Republicans at every level of

leadership from towns up to the DC are silent. Silence is compliance. I was hoping that maybe the Republicans in town were discussing ways to address the corruption and fascist trends. That we'd hear a statement from the RTC against Trump's genocide comments or against that appears in the Epstein files a million times. 2 minutes. One. One.

Not even one. All right, I'm hurrying. I thought I got 5 minutes. You did. Oh, shoot. Sorry. All right. Or or he's attacking of the Pope. Nobody silence. Nobody cares he's attacking the Pope. However, that hope was crushed recently when I read that the RTC is recruiting New Milford High School students for a Turning Point chapter in New Milford. Turning Point has been documented spreading racist, homophobic, misogynistic rhetoric. I was hoping that the RTC might come to recognize the fascist trends promoted by Trump, MAGA, and Turning Point, but instead they have dug in their heels deep into the MAGA philosophy. So, it is very difficult for me and for a lot of us to actually trust our Republican leadership when they won't speak up against Give me one of the crazy things that our administration is doing. Thank you.

[applause]

Okay, next we have Kate O'Keefe. Kate, please state your name, your address, and your your 5 minutes. Okay, thank you. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of the Town Council. My name is Kate O'Keefe and for the record I live on Dark Entry Road next door in Washington. Uh tonight I'm speaking tonight to share some preliminary concerns on behalf of the New Milford Clean Water Coalition. Thank you. Uh I am speaking tonight to share some preliminary concerns on behalf of the New Milford Clean Water Coalition regarding the placement of the Department of Public Works. Uh and as a community we have spent months here standing together to oppose the proposed battery storage facility because of risks to water, our environment, public health, safety, and wildlife. So, I need to ask this very simple question tonight. How can we as a town take that position and at the same time consider placing a Department of Public Works facility directly over the same aquifer system? How can the Century Brass where you're proposing siting the new DPW, it sits within the designated aquifer protection area. That aquifer serves thousands of homes in New Milford and in Brookfield. It's one of the major drinking water sources for the town of New Milford. Uh meanwhile, the Western Connecticut Council of Governments Hazard Mitigation Plan, which covers this region through 2026, makes it clear that the purpose of proper planning is to reduce damage to life, property, infrastructure, and natural resources. Yet here we are considering a plan which places fuel storage, road salt, chemical runoff, and heavy heavy equipment operations directly above the same water supply. The site is also not a clean slate. It's a historically contaminated industrial site which would be interrupted. It would be opened up and potentially adding more contaminations to the area. The environmental contamination is still actively being investigated by DEEP under a significant environmental hazard designation

as recently as February of this year, including documented reports of pollution migration towards residential drinking water wells on abutting properties. That means that this is not a theoretical risk, it's an active ongoing environmental concern. New Milford is vulnerable to multiple hazards including flooding which is considered likely in any given year. With changing climate patterns, precipitation is increasing, storm intensity is increasing, and runoff is increasing. What enters the ground does not stay there. Everything in the watershed flows into the West Aspetuck, into the Housatonic River and beyond. This is a connected regional water aquifer system. The town has already identified DPW operations as as environmentally vulnerable. Even the current facility is in a flood flood-prone area and has been flagged for relocation. So again I ask, if DPW operations carry environmental risk, why would we move them into one of the most environmentally sensitive areas in town? If we place an industrial site like this on top of a protected aquifer, we're setting a precedent. We're effectively saying that this land is suitable for industrial activity. That undermines everything that this community has fought for, not just with Flat Iron, but for the long-term protection of our water. Our plan of conservation and development states that development should avoid areas of adverse impacts to sensitive environmental areas. This is exactly that kind of area. This If this site is too sensitive for a battery facility, it's too sensitive for an industrial DPW complex. We cannot apply one standard to private development and another to ourselves. So I ask tonight for you to look at this through one lens and that's risk. Because once once contamination happens in an aquifer, there is no fix. There is no reversal. The consequences are permanent for our water, our homes, our health, and for generations to come. Thank you. Uh next Kate Losey.

Name, address, 5 minutes. Thank you. My name is Kate Losey. I'm at 4 South Avenue, New Milford. I am also here to speak about moving the DPW to the Century Mill Brass site. Um I spoke recently um encouraging the town to adjust course on the siting and approval of the Flat Iron battery storage facility and at the time of my comments it was very clear that the town had had a relationship with the company for almost 3 years. That they approved of its plans and they approved of its siting. I did not bring this up in my previous comments to prioritize the town doing the right thing, to take the right appropriate course of action on that project. I feel it's important now to remind you that I know the town worked with Flat Iron on that disastrous project. And it is clear to me now that the Flat Iron project was connected to moving DPW to the Brass Mill site. I am dismayed that despite the information learned during the course of the Flat Iron project about the fragility of the West Aspetuck River and our aquifer that Kate so eloquently spoke about just before me, that it seems that the town is not reassessing its approach to projects and project approvals, especially with this site. As I have said, I am an ecologist, but I have not said I believe in doing things right the first time. And in my presentation to the public on the Flat Iron project, I argued that

certain sites are just not appropriate for industrial development regardless of our ability as a civilization to do so. If the Century Mill Brass site was proposed today, would the town approve it? Would everyone be okay with it? I don't believe that. Um and because of that previous industrial activity on the site, it's contaminated and as a significant environmental hazard by our state's DEEP. So, if we did not want the battery storage project, why are we supporting the move of the DPW to this same fragile area? The best use of this site is to protect our town from flooding and to preserve our water so it is clean. Especially in the light of the flash flooding in Southbury, I'm confused as to why the town would think it was a good idea to move the emergency command center and a helicopter plaid to a place that could flood. What is the purpose of a helicopter plaid that's not available in an emergency? In my entire career, I know that the environment is second in the name of progress. And I am going to resist that. As an ecologist, in my field, I have documented too many things that have been lost. I watch the consequences of the impacts of air and water, the impacts to animal and insect populations,

[laughter]

to plant movements, and the results are higher rates of cancer, autoimmune diseases. And I am asking the town council to have a discussion at the next meeting about this planning process. It has to be improved. We have to make sure that we are taking the suggestions from WestCOG that did not suggest moving the DPW to that site. They suggested Piccadilly or the Pickett district and ensure that this plan fits within the town's open space planning. Thank you. That's all. Thank you. Okay, next we have Hillary Ram. Sure. It's Hillary Ram, 154 Guernsey Lane. Um that's hard to follow. I'm I feel I feel everything you feel. Um you know, I was I have this big long speech. I'm probably going to eat up some of my time here, but I just wanted to say like you made me think about when we watched the recent, you know, trip around the moon and you're looking at the Earth and it's that blue marble vision and I just wonder when our leaders are going to catch up with our world that is telling us, you know, we really have to start to pivot. We really have to start to prioritize these things that we take for granted and that we've always taken for granted, but that are starting to be scarce and we really must think about the blue marble and that we're on there all together.

And we got to we got to do this. You know, that's why I'm just so I just can't believe I'm here that we're all here talking about moving the DPW the DPW putting an industrial Department of Public Works facility over our drinking water aquifer. I mean, it's a risk that you can only get wrong once. In New Milford, our aquifer isn't an abstract environmental asset. It doesn't have a number on it. It's the irreplaceable source of our clean water for homes, schools, local businesses. A Department of Public Works site referred to as DPW by its very nature concentrates exactly the kinds of materials and activities that pose long-term contamination risks. Fuel storage, road salt, chemical runoff, equipment maintenance, stormwater discharge, and solid waste or transfer to you know, transfer station.

[snorts]

In fact, these are called regulated activities by DEEP, Department of Environmental Protection, which means they are prohibited over an aquifer. But our town is trying to circumvent regulations by calling, you know, we're saying with we're grandfathered in. Well, even the best practices, if we get ourselves there, no system is foolproof. Spills happen, leaks develop slowly and go unnoticed. And once contaminants enter an aquifer, they don't just disappear. They spread, they persist, and they're extraordinarily expensive and sometimes impossible to fully remediate. There was an environmental impact study done for the existing DPW relocation, I mean, location by the Economic Development Corporation recently. Can you confirm tonight that we have those reports and can you release those to the public cuz that will show us what a DPW does to the land it sits on? This isn't about opposing DPW operations. They are essential. It's about putting the right use in the right place. Siting an industrial complex over our primary aquifer is fundamentally at odds with basic risk management. You wouldn't build a landfill up uphill from your reservoir. Well, maybe you would actually, but that's another topic. There's also a financial argument that taxpayers should not ignore. Short-term savings from using a convenient parcel can be wiped out many times over by long-term costs, water treatment upgrades, emergency responses, legal liability, and declining property values. Preventing contamination is always cheaper than trying to fix it after the fact. We know this because New Milford taxpayers have spent $10 million over the course of cleaning up the Century Brass location. And now we're going to pollute it again? It just makes no sense. And then there's the legacy question. Decisions about land use over an aquifer aren't just

about today's budget cycle. They shape the health and the resilience of our community for generations. Once that water source is compromised, there's no reset. I've said it before and I'll say it again. All the water there is is all the water there is. New Milford has options. The town can support its DPW while choosing a location that protects its most critical natural infrastructure rather than putting it at risk. Clean water is not just another resource. It's the foundation that everything else depends on. Protecting it should be the priority that guides us. Thank you. Thank you. 30 seconds. Uh Carolyn Hyde. Carolyn, please state your name, address, and you have 5 Thank you. Carolyn Hyde, 31 Brook View Lane here in New Milford. Um dear Mayor Bass and the Republican Town Committee, I'm here tonight due to a post on several social media pages calling for students to join a local student chapter of Turning Point USA, aka Club America. The post states that the New Milford Town Republican Committee is excited to announce that we are launching a Turning Point USA student chapter. They want your teens, all in capital letters, to help build it. It goes on to talk about how this national educational organization focuses on youth civic engagement. In order to establish a local chapter, they need three students currently enrolled at New Milford High School to get it off the ground. Why do they need students enrolled at NMHS? Because Turning Point USA chapters are highly encouraged to be associated with schools. However, this goes against the guidelines to set up an activity group at New Milford High School. School guidelines state activity groups need to be student-initiated and have an employed member of the school as an advisor. The post put out on social media is saying the Republican Town Committee is recruiting teenagers as members. This is not student-initiated, nor do I

believe the contact listed, Mr. Scott Leddy, is employed by the Board of Education here in town. Rather, he appears to own um a print brokerage firm. The post continues on about students gaining resume building for college, learning real leadership experience, public speaking, event planning, civic knowledge, being part of a network that matters, and having community impact. At New Milford High School as well as Schaghticoke Middle School, there are many civic groups to join already in place. Each grade at New Milford High School has an executive club. There's Wingman, DECA, Key Club, Leo Club, Student Council, even a Young Republicans Club. Each offer all opportunities that Turning Point USA does and are already up and moving. Here is the thing that if the existing clubs don't offer, pre-printed posters and stickers for free that say things like protect our kids, arm our schools. Guns are our greatest equalizer. Stay awake, not woke. And additional offerings of Patriot rewards. Yep, collecting student IDs, bringing Turning Point USA-approved speakers in the school, being a recruitment warrior or persistent promoter will get you free merchandise, snacks, and maybe even a VIP experience at their natio- national convention. All they need are three kids and they will send them kits, banners, etc. for free. What does this teach the other students as they work hard to earn money for their needed funding of their clubs and organizations by hosting bake sales, candy grams, and movie nights? And again, is Turning Point USA coming into town really student-initiated or is an agenda being pushed by a Republican Town Committee? As a parent, it is very unsettling to see the solicitation by the RTC of teenage students to be part of a group on social media forums, including the Connecticut 30th State Senate District Republicans. Believe me when I say the students all know about Turning Point USA. They taught me about it. I didn't know about it when the whole Charlie Kirk thing happened. But lack of enough interest to start a student-initiated chapter on their own. Why is the RTC recruiting kids?

I understand that by Turning Point USA charter guidelines, the voting in of president, vice president, and treasurer of a group must occur by a May 31st deadline. I believe this might be the current social media push. Historically, Turning Point USA has created divisiveness in area districts. Speakers were canceled due to parent and student uproar both in Fairfield and most recently Thomaston. The Cheshire School Board voted against a group being started in their school cuz they did not believe it was student-initiated. This surprised me because Turning Point USA offers all the pre-written script if there's a pushback starting a club in your community. Home school groups are welcome to start clubs, but the posts I have seen are all for students who are currently enrolled at New Milford High School or surrounding towns who are motivated to make a difference. We're very lucky to have an extremely driven students in New Milford High School already without being part of Turning Point USA. So again, why the current push on social media to contact Mr. Leddy who has the support of the Republican Town Committee? Many town Republican Committee members have liked these posts recruiting children to Turning Point USA. One of the town council members, unfortunately Board of Ed member who is also the chairperson. If this club is going to be set outside school, then civic organizations like Girl Scouts, Scouting USA, and New Milford Youth Agency all offer programming without Turning Point USA polarizing rhetoric mentioned earlier. One minute. 30 seconds. Overall, as a parent, it upsets me that adults are recruiting children, especially to this sort of um information. I work with a lot of kids in school with in the schools. If they wanted it, they would have found it. Thank you. THANK YOU.

[applause]

AND BRIAN WHITFIELD. GOOD EVENING, MR. MAYOR, honorable members of the council. Brian Whitfield, Orcutt Lane, Gaylordsville, Connecticut. I really wasn't prepared to speak tonight, but my spoke with Caitlin before about pickleball. I wanted to tell her how great my younger brother, God rest him, who was great at uh baseball, softball, basketball, and then pickleball. I didn't know what the hell that was until I found out he passed away, and I still don't know what I can't play it. I can't bend my knee. That's one thing. The other thing I noticed is that uh members of our loyal opposition, members of the loyal opposition, even on the council, can't stand up and read this. This is not Republican. It's not Democrat. It's American. But we have people here who can't stand up and repeat it. I I I'm not prepared tonight to, and I'm glad because we shouldn't be debating things here. But I go back and I think about I congratulate the lady over here for what she said tonight. Free speech. Congratulate. Free speech is a wonderful thing. And I would hope that the people who spoke tonight against Turning Point would also speak together, speak against

things that AOC, Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries would try to push through our high schools. We know that in most universities and colleges, if you're a Republican or conservative, you're in deep trouble. You're not allowed to speak. I go back and I think about all the uranium deposits that the Clintons gave Iran. I go back and I think about all the money, the appeasement money that Barack Obama gave Iran saying, "You can only use it for welfare." And the mullahs said, "We'll do what we want." And I go back and think about Joe Biden who lifted all the sanctions against Iran. But I don't think those things should be discussed here. At least I wasn't prepared to. And we don't have the time. If we want to bring up politics like this, Mr. Mayor, I would ask you to spend a couple of dollars. And over here, or maybe over here, put a shovel and a broom. Thank you. Okay. [clears throat] Is that everything? Okay. Katie? I have a question, Mr. Mayor. Can I ask a question? Sure. So, several people expressed concern about moving the Department of Public Works to the Russell site. To To

To my understanding, that's not a decision that has been made, and there would have to be a proper process for that. Could Could you elaborate a little bit Certainly. If I could, I'd like to do that in my mayor's comments. Yes. That's okay. Of course. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Item 5A and B, I'd like to move that we approve the prior minutes and the tax collector report. So moved. Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? I. Opposed? I. Thank you. Any abstentions? Thank you. Mary, you going to go now?

Yep. Okay. First, I'm going to start with a couple things. First, the budgetary process. Uh the Board of Finance approved uh the budgets at their last meeting, so thank you uh to those boards, and thank you to all, both the Town Council, uh both uh the uh Board of Education, and the employees on both sides. Uh whereas next step in the process, on May 5th is a town meeting, and that's where the public can give input. We are also going to be setting on the May 5th uh meeting the actual date of the referendum, which will be May 16th, which is a Saturday, as uh the Town Council had expressed uh trying a Saturday referendum to see if we can get more people uh engaged in the process. A big thank you uh to Miss Heidi and Miss Teagan from the Housatonic Valley Health District for visiting at Advance Head Start classroom at Hill and Plain School on Friday. The students learned their hearts how their hearts work, what their heartbeats sound like, and how to keep their hearts healthy. Uh and they also saw real stethoscope, and then the students became Head Start doctors and built their own take-home stethoscope. Big thank you to Miss Hyde for having Miss Heidi and Miss Teagan uh in the class. Also wanted to uh thank the volunteers uh for all of their works as we celebrated the 25th uh year anniversary of the McCarthy Observatory. Can't believe it's been 25 years already. Wow. And also, for those who don't know, we have a second dome there now and a second telescope. So, big huge thank you to a wonderful uh donation that was given uh to uh the observatory. And another thing uh at uh I was at this uh wonderful event,

and uh I thank you for allowing me to speak a little bit uh the board did. But one of the things that was mentioned is that our observatory is in the top 41 observatories in the world when it comes to asteroid detection. So, very amazing. So, big thank you to Monty. He's the chairman of the observatory board, all the board members, the volunteers, the donors, the town, the Board of Ed, as this is a wonderful asset uh that calls New Milford home. And I don't know if everybody is aware, but we also have a planetarium. And that's at Sarah Noble School. And I know the Board of Ed had revamped that. I'd asked Superintendent Parlaf if we could open that up to the public, too, cuz that's a pretty cool planetarium. Uh and they do every uh month they do what's called Second Saturday Stars, so it's the second uh Saturday of the month, and you can go and you can check out uh the wonderful telescope. There's some great volunteers there. You can learn quite a bit. We have moon rocks there as well. So, please, if you get a chance, uh come and come and take care of that. Also, congratulations to Elephant's Trunk, as they had their uh uh uh opening this year on Sunday. And uh start time for that is 7:00 a.m. for those that want to come, and I bring that up, too, as those that do visit the trunk, you can also check out our New Milford Antique Trail, cuz we have lots of other stores that also have some wonderful treasures, and you can find those as well. And you can go to New Milford now. That's our tourism and community website. You can click the drop-down to our antique trail, and you can see all the participating area uh wonderful merchants. Also, the Housatonic Valley Health District has started their walking challenge. That's uh until uh April 30th. You can stop in Town Hall Monday through Friday, can pick up a free pedometer,

and you can count your steps for the challenge. We're challenging other towns that are in the district, too. So, that would be Oxford, Southbury, New Milford, Washington, Woodbury. So, it's just a great opportunity to get your steps in. You can go online to the uh district, and you can opt in and be a participant. I think that's great for us to get out, uh do some walking and exercise, and also uh you can get free pedometer. Uh Lanesville uh Fire Department renovation project uh continues. Subcontractor connected the remaining rooftop equipment and completed all the penetration work. Uh the roofing contractor sealed all the penetrations in the roof. The painting subcontractor continued painting the appara- apparatus bay. Contractor worked on site cleanup and miscellaneous projects. We'll continue to update as we're moving forward. I've also asked, once we get a little closer to uh finalization, to create an open house so that you, the public, can come in and see this beautiful facility. Also, for those that have uh come into the downtown, which are here tonight, and driven around, you've seen the flags are being placed uh over our lamp posts. Uh our Park and Rec today continued with the cleanup of the green. They did the de-thatching and the aeration of the green today. Uh, both Park and Rec and DPW were doing the cleanup of the sidewalks and the roads later [clears throat] on this week. And then the banners for the New Milford High School graduates and our Revolutionary War Patriots will be replacing those on the lamp posts as well. I did have a few people ask me, "Do we raise the US military service flag each and every month?" And we do. And we do that for each service. Uh, this month we did it for the US Coast Guard. So, we want to thank all those servicemen and women past,

present, and future for all of their service to our wonderful town and our country. Want to thank our youth agency students who participated in the design our voted who designed our vote I voted stickers. We had nine winners. And you're going to see those when you go out to vote in the municipal election and then in the state election this year. They'll be a little sticker that you'll get and our wonderful students uh, that participated uh, did those and a big huge thank you to Chris and Sandro our uh, registrars as well. And you can go to uh, the mayor's page to see the the winners the names of the winners. Uh, New Milford police uh, statistics. So, we've seen uh, a little bit of uptick. We've gone up to 150 this past week stops when it comes to motor vehicles. And as far as the the statistics, uh, currently motor vehicle stops so far this year is 924. In the year 2025 we had 1671. And the reason for the drop was because we had a pretty bad winter. So, we had a lot of snow, we had ice, and the department was more in tuned in having to answer to those type of calls. But on average last year we were at 111 when we were at 1671. Uh, this past week we did 150 stops. So, you can see as the weather's gotten better, we also had a grant that allows for distracted driving. So, our numbers are going up. Motor vehicle accidents. We had in the year 2025 this time we had 236. 49 were in parking lots. This year we've had 250 with 50 in parking lots. The reason for the increase was obviously we had a lot of bad inclement weather which did cause accidents.

[clears throat]

DUIs so far this year are down. In the year 2025 at this time we had 25. So far this year we have 19. We don't want to see any. Uh, uh, but we did see a little bit of reduction. And we continue with that as well. Our CIT officer responses and that is where our police uh, make calls that aren't traffic related. They're from things such as welfare checks, disturbing the peace, sexual uh, uh, domestic violence, uh, ambulance calls. We had 17 uh, reported. And it was about 208 or I'm sorry 788 service minutes that our police department worked so far in our CRT response for last month. Um, events. Uh, still got a lot of good stuff going on. And uh, so far Katie Morwinsville spring show on April 17th, 18th, and 19th 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. If you get a chance that's a beautiful historic property. Big thank you to Jeremy Ruman. And we have some wonderful artists and artisans there. If you haven't been to the hotel, it's a great treasure that we have in New Milford and as they say Gaylordsville. Also Vintage Mania on the 18th from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. at Pettibone. [clears throat] And if you're a comic collector, if you collect autographs, uh, if you collect figurines, um, this is a great place to go. And uh, Buck Ovia does this and Vintage Mania. Great place to pick up present either for your loved one yourself. Uh, and for the holidays that'll be upcoming. On April 19th at 12:00 noon here at Town Hall is is our Patriots Day celebration. Also on the 19th at St. John's Church is a celebration of women composers concert.

On April 22nd at Pettibone, Park and Rec is doing our Earth Day celebration. So, we'll have a lot of vendors there. We'll have a nice indoor movie as well celebrating Earth Day. April 23rd 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at the library is the Lawyers in the Library. This is uh, scheduled for 20-minute sessions. This is free pro bono library uh, that you're going to be experiencing as you go into college as your freshman year. This is time to get organized. So, you're going to learn what you need to bring if you're going to be on campus. And you get to hear from people that have gone through that. And this is part of our series when it comes to uh, college preparation. We have the youth agency's multicultural fair. That's going to be on April 25th at 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. on the green. And this is our youth agency's uh, uh, young group leadership group where we're talking about all of our different wonderful cultures here in New Milford and you uh, talk about the wonderful foods, the culture, and hopefully everyone can attend this. April 25th doors open at 5:00 p.m. Bingo starts at 6:00 p.m. is the New Milford Grad Party's Designer Bingo. That's going to be at the VFW and the proceeds are going to go to the grad party grad party committee. They're the ones that host the wonderful party that we have at the high school after graduation to keep our seniors safe. April 26th the doors open at 3:15 p.m.

Show starts at 3:45 p.m. at Pettibone the Girl Scout Troop 40324 presents the Thrift Fashion Show. Come and watch a wonderful fashion show and thank you to the Girl Scouts. April 29th 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the library is the Job Fair. So, if you're looking for new employment or you're someone new to the job market, you can come to the library 1:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. for the Job Fair. Also May 2nd Katie 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at Pettibone you have the Rotary Club Shred Event. That's an error. Oh, it is? It's 9:00 to noon. Okay, 9:00 to noon. Okay. everybody up early.

So, if you have uh, some documents that you would like uh, really compliantly taken care of in a safe manner, you can do that with the shred event that the Rotary's having and thank you to the Rotary for doing that as you guys do that couple times every year. Uh, also uh, the town of New Milford we're going to be taking the mayor's monarch pledge. And that is we are a bee city which is pollinators. How we know we how important that is. Also monarchs are very very important. Monarch butterflies part of the pollinators. So, we have uh, uh, done our pledge. And some of the things that we will be working on as we pledge is our continued uh, work uh, assessing and creating awareness for our pollinators. Uh, we're going to issue at the next meeting a proclamation. And this is to create the awareness about the decline of the monarch butterfly and the species needed uh, for that type of habitat as we're putting in our pollinator gardens. Uh, we're also going to encourage residents to plant monarch gardens. We're going to talk more about that. We're also going to ask the Garden Club to help assist us with that as they wonderfully do. And uh, we're also going to talk to homeowners associations uh, to identify opportunities to plant monarch gardens. So, it's all about creating the awareness as we have with bee city. Also some of the things we talked a little bit about DPW at first. Some of the things that we have going on right now. Uh, we started our road projects this year. And we started our first project today. And that is we started drainage work on Cornwall, right? And uh, we'll be providing a list of the work

that we're going to be doing. We're also going to be doing work on River Road some drainage work there as well. Tonight you're going to be hearing from our roads committee. So, I won't go into so much the roads as we have working on there. We did talk about the Truneerski Bridge this at our uh, public hearing. Also where in the slate is the Wheaton Road, Walker Brook Bridges, Squire Hill Road, Grove Street, Still River Bridge, Boardman Road Bridge. These are all bridges that we're looking in the upcoming years to uh, get our funding and then also move forward these projects. Uh, I think we've stated this before. Jack, how many bridges do we have in New Milford? 69. So, it's quite a lot of infrastructure that we need to continue to do. Our intersection improvements, Hine Hill and Grove Street, that's the traffic light that the Town Council voted to do. We got a grant for that. We're just waiting for OSTA, that's the state of Connecticut to give us uh final approval. We uh submitted the final submission, and that's at WestCOG. Elm Street and East Street, we talked about this before. It's another grant-funded project, and that's to widen Elm Street for left-hand turns all around, so that will ease traffic, especially those commuting uh in the evening and during the during the morning rush. Uh right now, we're just waiting for uh let me see here. We're waiting for the final We're waiting for a review, and also the hospital has to grant us some easement property there as well. Wellsville Wellsville Avenue, this is a reconstruction project, which will be a full reclaim on Wellsville, plus all of the sidewalks. It's another project. Uh we're continuing to work with property owners for easements, and also to Randy is reviewing uh that as well. Uh tonight,

uh for the Pettibone Pedal Park and pickleball courts, that was approved at the town meeting prior to our Town Council meeting. So, we're going to be getting to work uh on that as well. And then finally, moving in our as you had asked uh before concerning the DPW facility moving from where it is currently to the proposed Century Brass. And that is a couple things. First, as a kind of an overview, that would be the public would have to approve that. As there would be funding needed for that. Uh the question is, why would we move the DPW facility from where it currently is to a Century Brass brownfield site? So, first and foremost to the public that's here tonight and those watching, we all want to make sure our water is properly cared for. We all live in New Milford, and we all want to make sure that what we do uh not only helps the environment, but also helps us as residents who live here. And we all want to make sure it's safe and environmentally sound. So, in doing this, I'd asked Jack Healey as we were talking about this, and this has been talked about for way longer than I've been mayor. This has been talked about when Pat Murphy was mayor. 20 plus years. Thank you, Tom. So, I'd asked Jack, I'm like, "Can you, because we have a lot of people opining and concerned, and rightly so." So, as we had had people come here before when we first talked about the battery facility, we talked about people that are engineers, people that had uh history talking about it. I asked TRC, who is our engineering uh consultant, who's been doing this since the inception of the cleanup. I asked them to give us a a letter, which we'll be posting.

[clears throat]

This is to Jack Healey. Dear Mr. Healey, TRC Environmental Corporation is pleased to submit the following information regarding the planned remediation and subsequent redevelopment of the Century Brass Enterprise Center site located to formerly Century Brass property located in New Milford, Connecticut. TRC has been supporting the demolition, investigation, or remediation of the CEC, which is a Century Economic Center, and that, just so everybody knows, this was named that way before I was mayor. Just so everybody knows that. The goals since the inception of these activities have been to understand the environmental conditions at the site, mitigate deteriorated conditions to reduce and eliminate any threats to human health and the environment, remediate the site the site to allow for suitable reuse, and meet the requirements of the environmental regulations that the CEC is subject to, including the Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection voluntary remediation program, the Connecticut's remediation standard regulations, Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, the topic the Toxics Substance Control Act. The CEC was designated as an EPA brownfield site and received both EPA and Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development funding for investigation of spills and releases at the site. Using those funds, the vast majority of the investigation and remediation has been conducted, including the demolition of the building and cleanup of waste sludge lagoons. Remaining work to be completed including investigation of several areas of sludge concerns, that's in parentheses, AOCs, that have not been included in the prior work, an updated assessment of the ground water, and development implementation of the final remediate remedial activities to comply with the

RSRs and RCRA. [clears throat] At this time, the TRC has a preliminary plan for the remaining reme- remedial activities that were developed based on the proposed reuse as a new public works department complex. Use of engineered controls where appropriate, and administrative controls as specified in the RSRs, and incorporating the proposed redevelopment such as plan for the art the for the E the CEC into remediation plans can be a very cost-effective means of achieving compliance with the RSRs. TRC believes that the planned use of the site as a DPW facility is suitable and allows the town to meet its regulatory obligations in a cost-effective manner while returning the site to productive reuse at minimal risk to the environment for the following reasons. The site has been designated as a brownfield redevelopment site and has been underutilized since the CEC ceased operations. TRC has, from the beginning of the investigation and remediation process, considered the end use of the site in remedial planning. The presence of a clay layer a clay layer below the site reduces the likelihood of a contamination mitigation pathway to the aquifer located at and around the CEC. A new DPC A new DPW facility will include up-to-date best management practices for all material storage to reduce possible spills, releases, making the site a low-risk use. TRC appreciates the opportunity to be of continued service to the Town of New Milford at the CEC and looks forward to assisting with the final remediation and redevelopment. If you have any questions, and they put in here, which will be putting in here.

We also, as we've talked about to the to this uh Town Council many times before, it's also been brought up that maybe a possibility within this is a solar array, too, that would be not only on the ground, but also on the buildings if the public so chose to move forward with this project. I'd also like to move as everyone is very concerned about the aquifer protection area, as am I. Does everybody know what's in the aquifer protection area? Does everybody know how big it is? By show of hands, does everybody know that the brand new Connecticut Department of Transportation center is on Kent Road, right across the street from the brewery? Did you know that's on the aquifer? It's right on the brewery. Did you know that's on the aquifer? Yes. But yet, no one was here. It was grandfathered. No one was here. Did you also know who is here that's on the aquifer? Do you know Canterbury School's on it? Did you know that New Milford Farms, which is where we go and dispose of uh you know, some of our leaves and ground stuff, that they're in the aquifer? Did you know that the Heritage Inn, which is right over here, that's on the aquifer? Uh also, uh let's see, the bike will see A&J Auto's on there. Did you also know that uh I'm just picking out some names here as I'm seeing all this stuff. Uh did you all know also know that uh Big Y complex is in the aquifer? Did you know that the uh gas station is in the aquifer?

Did you know Did you also know that McDon- Did you also know that McDonald's Yeah, did you also know that McDon- Did you also know that McDon- Did you also know that McDonald's is in the aquifer? Did you know that all of those Did you know that all of those Did you know that all of those areas Did you know that all of those areas are in there? And the reason why I bring that up is all of these entities need to comply with aquifer protection. And aquifer protection is done, right, through our inland wetlands, as well as our work with the Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection. We should all be concerned, but also know that there is technology. There's technology that helps. There's technology that overcomes barriers. Now, as somebody said we have a 1950s Century Brass Plant, which is back in the 1950s, that would be a problem. But there are new technologies. Jack, if you could come up and talk about the new technologies and what our plant would do, so we would make sure they would be safe and environmentally sound. Thank you, Ken. Um anyway, um when we when this building will be designed and constructed, uh we'll be working with our engineers and consultants. For sure. We'll We'll be used We'll be working with our consultants. Um just as a background, I've worked in industry and we changed the way we build buildings and we design them. We build them such that there's a a membrane or there's other ways of preventing anything from getting out of the building. We do that because I work with facilities that use chlorinated solvents, plating solutions, much more aggressive than we're talking here.

We've talked with TRC how we would design this. The um we would talk with the EEP. We have a relationship with them. Everything that we would do would go through the Aquifer Protection of of the town and also to the state. Uh it has to be reviewed by both levels. Um we're looking at making this a a environmental You know, everything for the last couple years we've talked about this. This is going to be an environmentally progressive uh state-of-the-art public works facility. Um it will have protections in place to ensure that the groundwater and the soils are protected. And you know, Jack, uh it was mentioned uh during public participation that there's still remediation work that needs to be done on the property. And also they had mentioned about some wells. Can you talk about that? Yeah, we are we are in a process to be in the process started a while ago. And when you reference the RCRA, which is called Recra, it's a it's a Part B facility and there's a process for going through that. We are working with the DEP on on that process. And I know I always talk with the mayor I talk about AOCs, he looks at me he said, "Okay, explain." The areas of concern are areas that are identified in the studies over the last 20 years. We're working our way through those and those would be remediated and to the extent that the DEP requires it prior to us doing any work in those areas. Um that's that's a requirement. That's part of a closure plan. The closure plan is approved by the DEP. I worked on many of these over the years. Uh this is a plan and it's a it process it go through a process and it meets the requirements of DEP and EPA prior to us doing any work there. Uh that's part of the schedule. Um the wells um we have done There was a significant environmental hazard um filed with the state of Connecticut. This was filed like 2012 or something like that. Um we have checked the records, talked to Mike Prestman, done some well sampling. Uh we are in the process of getting uh the

significant environmental hazard was submitted to DEP asking them to close the significant environmental hazard. Well, it is now with their management team to be in reviewed of the data that we supplied to them. Thank you, Jack. And [snorts] also just uh for those that haven't been on the town council and kind of uh uh just as going back uh for memories, we've been talking about this for many years now. Yeah. Uh environmentally concerning is where the DPW facility is right now. Exactly. DPW facility is just a stone's walk to the river. And as some people were talking about uh our Economic Development Corporation did a study. We're waiting for the finalization as they're doing wells and once that's completed, we will be bringing this to the council and the public. And I might add those that haven't been to New Milford for for a long time, before that was a DPW facility, that was a railyard. And in that railyard, that's where they turned the actual locomotives way back in the day. So we want to make sure environmentally, because that's right there too, that I'm almost certain there's going to be remediation. There has to be. It was an old railroad yard. So in talking with our consultants, the prudent thing would be is we want to clean up is we want to take care of things. We want to do it the most safe and environmentally possible way that we can. And we're not going to do anything until we continue to alert the public more, go through all these processes. But you may be hearing how we're trying to just like jam this through. We're absolutely not. This is something that's been going on since Mayor Murphy's time here as mayor. And we're just continuing to move forward with the process. But you know, also

you know, it can't be environmentally the best thing in the world to have our DPW trucks that can't fit into the facility outside. There's like five, six million dollars worth of machinery just sitting out there. Cuz we don't have the space. Why wouldn't you go into a brand new state-of-the-art facility like the Connecticut Department of Transportation did? They already did it. Right on the aquifer, right on Route 7. If you haven't seen it, you can go look at it. It's right across the street from the brewery. It's right there. Yes. And they used modern ways to help Sorry, I I just want to be the first to express my strong opposition to this. I support the riverfront revitalization. I support relocating DPW, but I think it would be a catastrophic mistake to put DPW at the Century Brass site. I don't think I'm alone in that. I think there are many people in the community that are deeply concerned about that. Um when Flatiron was going to have something here, I think it was Thomas Esposito proposed that we all raise our hands, those who were in support of the opposition. I I I would ask now those who are in support of the uh of the DPW being moved to Brass Mills, please raise your hands. You're not allowed to do that now. That was then, this is now, Ari. We have a mayor. You're not the mayor. I know you wish you were, but you're not. I think I think Okay, I think Yes. right next to the exit the old railyard to the very front of the property, away from all of that. There is no comparison whatsoever. I would still stand behind the again Flatiron down there, but I have discussions for the last 20 years about moving that. If you would

participated in the 2010 or 2020 year conservation and development, you would know hundreds and hundreds of people from both parties agreed to it. Many people with environmental and engineering backgrounds, okay, agreed that the DPW should not be in our downtown and should be in our industrial zone on a property that we own, that we spent tons of money and got grants to clean up. And as our engineers have stated, it's completely safe and a smart use of the property. Once again, grandstanding by yourself and others who showed up here tonight to get themselves on TV to make a big deal of nothing. If you would paid attention or had been on former committees like most of the other people sitting around the table except for a handful, you would have known about this project 20 years ago. I think moving forward, what I think we're going to continue to do, Ari and Tom, is we're going to continue to bring forward to the public uh what the plans would be uh so that people could see that this is a safe uh use. But at the end of the day, it's going to be the public that's going to decide. They're the ones who are going to say whether or not we're going to do this or not do this. Right. Thank you. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Yes. Yep. All right. Moving on item six, I'd like to move to approve the following uh 6 A, B, C, D, E, and F. These are road closures. Like to approve the following closures. For the Bank Street Group, closure of Bank Street. For the Rock the Block, and these concerts will be June 18th, July 16th, August 13th, and September 17th of this

year from 3:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. and they have rain dates in uh June and July, etc. after that. Uh item B, the Litchfield County Irish-American Club would like to have the closure of Sunny Valley Road and Sunny Valley Lane. That would be July 18th, 2026 from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. for the road bowling tournament. Yay. Item C, uh Brian Cody's Brothers and Sisters are requesting the closure of Young's Field Road, and that would be from 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. at the southern crossover on the green and from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. on August 29th uh for uh I think they're having a race. It didn't put that on here, but okay. Uh D item, it would be the New Milford Com- Commission on the Arts requesting the closure of the southern crossover, and that would be June 27th, 2026 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. That's the annual New Milford Arts Festival on the green. Everybody should go. Item E, the mayor's office and the Veterans Committee is requesting closure of Bridge Street, Railroad Street, Bennett Street, and part of the green on May 25th, 2026 from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. for the annual Memorial Day parade. And item number F, uh letter F, excuse me, New Milford celebrates America and the DAR requests the closure. That's the Roger Sherman Chapter. Uh the closure of Church Street from Main Street to the municipal parking lot behind Town Hall, and that's going to be on April 19th, 2026, from 11:45 a.m. to 1:15 p.m. for a Patriots Day cemetery. Do I have a second?

Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Okay. Pardon? It's a ceremony on a cemetery. It's a ceremony. That's what it says. No, but you said cemetery. Oh, I guess I must have been thinking of something else. I needed a cemetery. Okay, item number seven. I'd like uh this is a Parks and Recreation Department request uh that we approve the donations as follows. This is a These donations are for their 8-mile and 5K road race. Uh $750 from Dawn Huff, $500 from M and Tree and Landscaping, $250 from Garrity Water Solutions, $250 from Candlewood Valley Pediatrics. They uh request [clears throat] that these be deposited in the recreation revenue account. 1045050044709. Parks and Rec would like to thank these donors very much for their generosity. Item number eight. Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Yeah, sorry, Paul.

a second? Thank you, Tom. Any discussion on the motion? All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Any abstentions? Thank you. Okay. Item number eight, uh A and B. Item number eight A. Uh the Town of New Milford requests that we approve the acceptance of a $500 grant funding through the Connecticut Fair Plan Anti-Arson Committee. The funds will be used to purchase a high-resolution camera to document fire scenes for arson investigations. [cough] Do I have a second [clears throat] on that? Second. Thank you.

Thank you. Any discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Any abstentions? Thank you. Item eight B. The Town of New Milford has awarded a uh for year 2026 distracted driving high-visibility enforcement, known as DDHVE grant, for $18,022.99. And this comes from the Connecticut Department of Transportation Highway Safety Office. The office is to conduct a high-visibility in traffic enforcement during the applicable grant period, which will be April 3rd, which we already had, through April 30th, 2026. The funds will be received into an account determined by the Director of Finance. Do I have a second?

Thank you, Paul. Any discussion? All those in favor? Oh, sorry. Zach? Sure. Uh when it says high-visibility traffic enforcement, what exactly does that mean? So, high visibility would mean you would see the officer. You'd see them on, say, Route 7, Grove Street. So, it would be that it wouldn't be like there'd be radar traps. You would visibly see them out patrolling. Okay, so it's exactly what it sounds like. I just wanted to clarify. Absolutely. [laughter] Thank you. Okay. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Any abstentions? Thank you. And item number nine. I'd like to move that we approve the uh donation to the New Milford Public Library. It's a donation of seeds valued at $100. That comes from the Village Center for the Arts. The donation would be used to distribute to patrons. Second? Second. Thank you. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Any abstentions? Thank you. And item 10. Presentation. Mr. Whitman, if you could come up and talk a little bit about our planned capital roads improvements this year.

[clears throat]

Well, good evening. I'm John Whitman. I think this is my uh It's my uh That is my uh my other hat I wear, the Sewer Commission. [laughter]

That's my uh my business manager. Um I think this is my eighth time presenting this thing, and it's a privilege. I do appreciate it. And uh we started the committee in 2017. And uh I think we have most of our members are still here, and one of my esteemed members is Geraldine Lukowicz. Hello. And to your husband. And I and I thank you very much for allowing me to do this again. It's been a very good year. Uh in 2025, we did a lot of work. We did an awful lot of work. And let me just start this thing going here. So, this year, we repeated what we've done in the past, and we held public meetings uh on Zoom on March 3rd and Friday, 4th, and it was us and and the DPW folks. And oh, there you are. And Chuck and and Jack. And uh these are for people that resided on the roads that reside on the roads that are going to be worked on this year. And in 2026, we have approximately 13 miles of roads that will be reha- rehabilitated either with reclaiming, milling and paving, overlay, and a chip and rubberized chip sealing. Rubberized chip sealing, uh you can see that on Aspetuck. Uh also see it on Grove Grove Street. That was done a bunch of years ago. Boy, did that stuff hold up. Oh my goodness, did that hold up. That that Yeah, really did. Uh we wanted to know the specifics about each road that may not be apparent to us, like drainage problems, icy spots, uh sight distance issues, et cetera. And we asked that comments and questions be sent to us using the new uh SeeClickFix, and that we were going to take the residents' feedback like we've done in the past years, and and combine that with our current engineering that we've already done on the roads. So, this is what we've done in the last uh 3 years, and this is this was about a 20-year program all total, probably a full 20 years to do this whole thing. And the we started out uh Mr. Mayor with the arterials and the collectors, you

know, and the worst-performing roads, and really knocked a lot of those out. And in 2023, 10.4 uh miles paved, 10.6 chip sealed, 24 some point eight miles paved, uh 5.5 miles uh chip sealed, and we also did 5.9 miles of the rubberized chip sealing. And in 25, 4.4 miles paved and 2.27 chip sealed, uh for a total in last 3 years at 22 uh 22 and 3/4 um uh miles paved and 18 miles chip sealed, and again, 5.9 miles with the rubberized chip, which is a fabulous product. So, this year, the capital road program is Cornwall Drive, and that's going to be from Putnam to Long Mountain. That's going to be a reclamation process. Adams Lane is Cornwall to the end, reclamation. Uh Sunrise Lane, Hine Hill Road to the end, reclamation. Sand Road, Aspetuck Ridge to Long Mountain, again, reclamation. And Jerusalem Road, Sunny Valley Road to Candle Candle Candlewood Lake Road North, and that's ex- uh um reclamation. Now, this is These are the capital roads, but there's still 13.0 miles of other work that's going to be done, overlays, chip sealing, rubberized chip sealing where where appropriate and when we can when we can afford to do it on certain roads, right, Mr. Mayor? Absolutely. And so, that this is just a portion of the 13.0 miles that is a capital capital part of the capital projects. So, some of the work that we've uh that we've done in the past, uh you'll see on the left-hand side, that's actually a new catch basin and a catch basin top, all complete the uh complete um uh replacement. We've taken out some corrugated uh corrugated metal pipe that's absolutely just just fell apart, completely fell apart. In fact, it's so bad that that many years ago, well, not many, about 3 years ago, we tried to camera some of it, and the camera did not like the fact that it was going

across the bottom of that that pipe. So, we've been We've really found some of this stuff, and we're taking it out where we can find it, some 24, 30-in wide stuff, uh and replacing it with with modern technology. And here, there's full-depth reclamation where we chop up the what's out there, and we'll re- we'll relay it and relay it, and and in the process of doing that, some of the road elevations are are raised, and I'll show you that we do some driveway aprons to take care of that. And here, they're replacing catch basin tops, bringing them up to the height before we start we start to start paving, and you'll see that they they carefully uh mark the edges of those uh catch basin tops in the traveled way because they are hazard and to put that in a fluorescent paint where it shows up and you'll see also we did that on the Route 7 project when that was paved and some of the manholes there were were raised. And then what we had to do and they're mostly all the uh sewer commission manholes, my other my other hat. And what we had to have them do is we had have them ramp up all of those those catch basins, ramp them up so that you went like this over them instead of over them and also paint them, right? So, that was a thing that we had to do. It was after the fact because there were a lot of a lot of complaints about hitting those things and they ramped them up, made them a lot safer. And that's why we paint them to make them safe so they show up especially at night. Why do we shut it off? Oh, there it goes. All right, and there's I think make sure I got the right thing. Yep, I do. And then now we're going to paving it. Now you see we're going to pave it in two courses. We're going to pave it in two courses. And then now we're going to be doing some curbing and the curbing is is put down on the base course so that we put the top course down, it locks it in, right? You'll see when when you go that you see there's on the left hand side there's a little bit of a ridge there.

Then the top course goes in, it locks locks the curb in so it doesn't get knocked out with a plows or just you know, banging up against it. Uh and aprons used to be used to be used to be. It's not that way anymore, right right Jack and and and and Chuck. It used to be that there was a standard we go out a certain number of feet and then we do it. And but the whole idea is that the water is supposed to if the water had stayed on the road prior to the paving, the water should still stay on the road prior to the paving and it'll be adjusted. The aprons will be adjusted uh to make sure that to the best of our ability the water water stays where it's supposed to be, runs off onto the road, not back into the driveway. And now we're topsoiling and hydroseeding. Uh there's been some really nice product that we've been putting down, having the contractors put down on the side of the road, really really nice product and they'll hydroseed it and I've seen some really really nice restoration jobs done of late. Last couple of years it's really they've really ramped up what they've done for restoration. And then the guardrails.

[snorts]

And then pavement marking. There's you see on the left hand side they're putting a a stop mark a stop line uh on on the paved paved road and then a a double line right there. So, at the end we wanted the residents again to to put their comments down and see ClickFix. Uh our Facebook place is also another place where we wanted them to go take a look. Uh they also said that you know, if we were told them if they they didn't like either option, they weren't really into the social media aspect of it or that technology, go ahead and give uh our our office a call and and they're more than more than happy to take down what you want and pass it on to these fine gentlemen that they can bring it to their staff and get worked on. And we we we very much look forward to another very successful year. It's been great. We started out with a list that was like it was like well, it was like this trifle big thing to do, right? We and it's really a lot of work under under the under the leadership of the mayor and the town council and the funding that you've been able to provide us, we've taken care of those those majority of those major roads, the arterials and the collectors, right? The mayor's talked about what's going to happen with Wellsville Road, some grant money and some wonderful things that's going to happen there. Look at the bridges we've done, Sand Road. Now we're going to get the road done, too. So, there's been a lot of done and I'm very proud to be part of the process that started about 8 9 years ago and we're still going on with it and the major major roads have been taken care of. Now we're just going to take care of the rest of them. And the idea is that when we do a road job now, we don't go back in about 4 or 5 years and fix something because we didn't do it right. The whole idea is that this capital money that has been approved by by the council and the public is going to be going into roads that last 20 years or last 25 years. And what we do right now is we go back and we maintain them. You're welcome. We go back and we maintain them after that so that they stay they stay that way. We'll either chip seal them, we'll we'll rubberize chip seal them, we'll do all the kind of works, we'll do we'll do what we have to do to maintain that road

so we don't have to go back and completely rip it up again cuz we didn't do it right and make and take care of it. And that has been the last that has been the major I think the major impetus of this entire program, Mr. Mayor, is that money we're spending, we're being very careful how we spent it and how we take care of the money we spent. We we use that money as an investment. So, Good job. Thank you. Questions, folks? Thank you for your service. And John, a big huge thank you to you, the commit the committee working with our DPW team, a big huge thank you. Um as we continue to work on this infrastructure that's so important to our town.

It's fun. It is. Big thank you. Thank you. You all want a good road. You're welcome. You're welcome. Thank you, John. I would like to second the mayor's comments and thank you very much. [applause] You guys have done an amazing work so far. I just wanted to say, you know, on the top of your list there was Cornwall Drive. I live on Putnam Road and I have within the last 72 hours had three or four different neighbors come up to me and say, "Can you bring this up?" So, I just want to say thank you very much for Oh, you're very welcome. I'm proud to represent the committee and again I say this is fun because we're getting some real good stuff done. Yep. John? I second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Opposed? Any abstentions? Thank you, everyone.