First Selectman Weekly Update 11-8-2019
Hello North Stonington. Another busy week ends here in town!
Election day is behind us and we had a great turnout here with 1796 votes cast! Congrats to all the newly elected leaders in town and everyone who was willing to serve! Special thanks to the poll workers for all their work keeping things running smoothly. Thanks to those who put the “vote today” signs out reminding neighbors to vote.
On a personal note I would like to thank Brett Mastroianni for challenging me during this election. It was a very close race and my takeaway is that there need to be improvements made. I would like to summarize a few immediate changes that will take place.
Brett and Mike day after election reviewing election results
Although unprecedented communication efforts were made during my first term including the use of social media, weekly updates, staff meetings, collaborative meeting with Board of Finance, Education, and Selectmen, and OpenGov for budgeting and citizen engagement; clearly more needs to be done. To that end I am implementing weekly “drop ins” Wednesdays from 12-1pm and the 3rd Monday of the month from 6:30-7:30pm. This will be an informal opportunity for neighbors to stop by and express any feedback and concerns on town issues. Residents can always text, call, email, or message me any time, but this will provide another outlet for communication. Everyone is always welcome to visit Town Hall any time or contact me directly to make an appointment.
Additionally, we will be modifying our Selectmen’s meetings to allow for non-agenda items to be discussed. We will still have time limits that are loosely enforced to be respectful of everyone’s time, but this will allow the public to bring any and all concerns directly to the Selectmen at our regular meetings.
In short, I know I can do better as your First Selectman in my second term and I take very seriously the concerns of those whose support I did not earn this election. I also know there have been many strong opinions during the election season. I have already met and spoken with many of my opponents and am working hard to listen to their feedback and make corrections wherever possible. Please reach out to me in anyway mentioned above to express your feedback.
Our new weekly videos are starting this week. As mentioned previously, they will be focused more specifically on topics happening in town. I will provide written updates to cover weekly happenings and I also am hoping to offer a podcast/verbal recording of these. If you have topics you are interested hearing more about, please email us at selectman@northtoningtonct.gov. We will continue to issue written updates on the weekly happenings around town. Please check out the town website to see the new weekly videos and sign up for news and announcements to be notified when the come out.
Our first weekly topic will be a more in depth look at the school building project with Chairwoman Dr. Pamela Potemri. The video is here for those who are interested in seeing it by clicking this link
Today Bob, Nita, and I, along with Senator Somers and many others, had the great opportunity to attend the Veteran’s Day Ceremony at the Elementary School. I can’t properly convey how special this ceremony is. It is such a humbling experience to honor those who have served our country and see the respect our children have for these great men and women.
The final stages of the Center for Emergency Services are wrapping up. As you may remember we moved forward on the 3 bay storage building. As a reminder, the original building when approved had been slated to be approximately 15,000 square feet larger than we were able to build due to budget constraints. This building is the compromise we were able to come up with to achieve our space needs. With this building we will now have ample storage now and for years to come It will house our UTV, boat, and forestry truck so we are able to have fast and easy access to these pieces of equipment which will increase response time. I am happy to report when complete we will have still come in under the allotted $6.36 million this project had been approved at. We have also begun the solar installation at the Center for Emergency Services. We look to see completion of this within the next month. This will help offset our energy costs providing an estimated 40% reduction in utility costs as well as the great environmental impact it has.
We had a nice visit the day after the vote from some of our kindergarteners learning about the importance of voting. Thanks to Gladys Chase for teaching them all about voting! It’s always a great day when the kids come to visit!
In highway news, this week we continued to cleanup storm damage from storm #1 and then responded to storm #2 which also cause several roads to be closed. The highway department worked in the early morning hours to open 3 of the 7 roads closed by storm #3. Within hours 3 roadways were opened and 4 remained closed to trees on the wires. Four highway department employees attended a traffic control safety class and are now certified traffic controllers. Due to their attendance the town received 12 new traffic signs 24 traffic cones and safety equipment free. Catch basins on Wyassup Rd and Main St were cleaned out by hand rather than hire a vacuum truck for a small job. They removed a beaver dam that was built over the week on Kingswood development.
Next week weather permitting the highway crew will be continue to cleanup from recent storms. Numerous areas still have many trees that need to be removed and cleaned up. We will continue for winter storm preparation and also tree work continues.
That’s it for today, we hope everyone has a great weekend!
Mike Urgo
First Selectman