Community News

Garet&Co returns to Battell Chapel March 9 from 7:00 to 8:30 p.m. to present “Interior,” four works that portray human emotion. 

The performance will be “in the round,” allowing the audience to witness the dancing up close and from all sides. All four pieces were first showcased in late January at Garet&Co’s “Eclipse” at the Warner Theatre, but have since been refined, adjusted and extended. 

The show will be followed by a Q&A and reception with dance artist, educator and choreographer Garet Wierdsma and the company. The dance performance is presented in partnership with the United Church of Christ Congregational.

There will be two dance classes presented Friday, March 8, also at Battell Chapel. From 4:00 p.m. until 5:00 p.m. a beginner’s class will offer a first introduction to contemporary dance. From 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. there will be an intermediate class in Contemporary Storytelling, structured similarly to Garet&Co’s open company classes. Wierdsma will lead dancers through an improvisational warm up, focusing on control and balance. The class culminates in a short combination where dancers explore storytelling in contemporary dance. The class is appropriate for dancers of many ages and skill levels.

Click here to register for the classes or for tickets to the Saturday performance.

Garet&Co is a professional contemporary dance company based in northern Connecticut. Wierdsma’s choreographic work deals with themes of struggling mental health and the search for peace within chaos. She first pulls from her own experiences and then collaborates conceptually and in movement with the dancers in hopes of giving audiences the opportunity to fully experience the joy, devastation and catharsis of contemporary dance. 

—Newsletter Editor

Young thespians at Botelle School flitted around the stage in the school’s Hall of Flags Thursday afternoon, following the directions of choreographer Michelle Padua as they practiced for the upcoming production of Disney’s “Frozen Jr.”

“Frozen Jr.” is based on the 2018 Broadway musical and features all the memorable songs from the original animated film.

The play will be performed exclusively for fellow students March 21 at 10:00 a.m., but families, friends and townspeople are invited to attend subsequent free performances on March 22 at 7:00 p.m. and March 23 at 2:00 p.m.

Parents Becky Keyes and Megan Schneider are directing the play, which has a cast not of thousands, as in a Cecil B. DeMille extravaganza, but rather of 15 youngsters.

Schneider likened the rehearsals, which started in January and continue twice weekly, to “herding cats.” “You think they aren’t listening to you, and then at the end it all comes together,” she said.

Similarly, she and Keyes felt apprehensive when they undertook their directorial roles. “We were told that a lot of [volunteers] weren’t doing it this year. We thought, ‘What have we gotten into?’ Then people started signing up—moms, husbands and grandmas.”

Indeed, it has turned into a family affair. Michelle Padua’s entire family has pitched in, with her husband, mother and grandmother all helping. “Even my little son has helped,” she said.

Grandmother Teri Padua was working on costumes with Amy Bennet and Theresa Padua. Asked how many costumes were needed for the production, she sighed and said, “thousands.” She later admitted that to be an exaggeration but said some children had up to five roles with costume changes to match. 

The amateur seamstresses hit the Goodwill shop in Torrington last week to find garments that could be altered to fit the children and were busy trying them on the little actors, pinning here and tucking there as they tried to envision the finished products.

Other parents were busy painting scenery, while all the time the children danced, following their mentors around the stage.

—Newsletter Editor 

The drainage upgrades to Maple Avenue are expected to be complete March 1, according First Selectman Matt Riiska. Grading and removal of the remaining asphalt on the road will follow in preparation for putting down the binder course of paving in early April.

Riiska said the road will be unpaved for three to four weeks while other work is done, including installing the framework into which cement will be poured for the sidewalks.

“They will work on the wall in front of Manor House and there will be excavation to clean up the sides of the road,” he said. “All that will happen depending on the weather.”

—Newsletter Editor

As the plan for a new firehouse nears the end of the land use permitting process, attention is shifting to the capital campaign that will help to fund its construction.

The current cost estimate for the new building and site development is $6 million.

First Selectman Matt Riiska revealed to the Board of Finance Feb. 22 that two residents—Tony Kiser and Carlene Laughlin—have each pledged $250,000 to the fund drive.

“We are unbelievably lucky to have that, Riiska said after the meeting. “It’s a big commitment on their part. The goal is to kick off the capital campaign with the $500,000 they have committed, and to get another $500,000 from additional contributions. The more money people contribute, the less we will have to borrow.” 

The town has already been assured of a $2.5 million grant from the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection. “If we can get another million dollars from the capital campaign, $3.5 million will make a big dent in the cost.”

Riiska told the Board of Finance that he is investigating other available grants.

The generosity of town residents has not stopped with the firehouse. Riiska said about $110,000 has been donated to help fund work envisioned for City Meadow, where the removal of invasives and plantings of native plants are planned.

“We’ve had some very generous contributions to City Meadow,” he said. “We have such generous people who are so dedicated to the town.”

City Meadow has been an ongoing project for the community since 2011. It was first envisioned as a stormwater collection system to prevent pollution from reaching the nearby Blackberry River. But a more inclusive vision unfolded as residents imagined the area as a passive recreation area connecting Station Place and Shepard Road. A stormwater treatment plan was developed, invasives were removed and handicap accessible boardwalks were established. More recently, Robertson Plaza was expanded with stairs leading down to City Meadow walkways.

But invasives are hard to eradicate and now further work is needed. Riiska said the contributions will be used to again remove invasives and replace them with native vegetation.

“We’re in the process signing contracts with the remediators, a Massachusetts firm called Native Habitat Restoration,” he said. The first stage of work will cost $25,000, but much more is to follow. “There will be a lot going on. The idea is to get it tidied up so we can develop a planting plan.”

He said the town did not go to bid in hiring the firm because the town’s consultant had previously worked with this firm. “We chose this person a long time ago,” Riiska said. “Not many people apply herbicides.”

The first evidence of progress will be when the Meadow is mowed to remove mature phragmites and cattails. “That way, when they start to grow back, we can see them and herbicides can be applied,” Riiska said.

Additional work will remove trees and woody invasives. 

—Newsletter Editor

First Selectman Matt Riiska revealed to the Board of Finance Feb. 22 that the town is being sued for a “slip and fall” incident that occurred three years ago on the slate sidewalk in front of Battell Chapel. 

“It’s not our property, but state statute says we have to maintain sidewalks in the town,” he told members. 

The issue will go to a jury trial next week.

Riiska predicted changes in town procedures as a result. “We will have to have an ordinance for snow clearing and to do some work on more sidewalks,” he said. “At some point, I need to get together with Troy [Lemere, DPW foreman] and talk about walks.”

He said the town had already planned to work on the walk between Berkshire Country Store and the National Iron Bank. The sidewalks soon be installed on Maple Avenue will be brushed concrete and will not present a problem, he said.

Being sued is not opportune for a town that is already trying to save every dime to recover from the havoc of 2023 when a series of natural disasters strained municipal coffers. Riiska said the town’s 2023-24 budget is “okay,” but added that he has instructed town departments “not to spend anything unless it is absolutely necessary.”

“We have enough salt for three more [weather] events. After that, don’t go out,” he said, eliciting laughter from finance members. “Usually, if we have money toward the end of the fiscal year we try to do a couple of things—tree cutting by our crew and drainage work along the roads. But the plan this year is not to do anything unless we absolutely have to.”

The town retrieved $208,000 from its state LoCIP account, which Riiska said “put a good dent” in the town’s $567,000 out-of-pocket expenses for flood recovery.

On a positive note, he reported that Botelle School’s two aged boilers are working without further mishap after each went down on successive days early in the winter. Now considered past permanent repair, their replacement cost is expected to be about $164,000.

Finance Chairman Michael Sconyers said budget work will begin in earnest in April but Riiska, who said his budget “has been on my screen every day for months,” asked that finance members direct questions to him in March so he can have answers in April.

The Grand List is not yet complete and cannot be accurately factored in. “That makes a huge difference,” he said.

Sconyers noted that this is not a revaluation year and there “are not a lot of mansions being built,” but Riiska expects an increase because of the number of homes being remodeled. 

The final budget—which will include Region 7, local education and municipal expenses—will go to a hearing in late April and a May 13 town meeting. 

—Newsletter Editor

NORFOLK—The Planning and Zoning Commission Tuesday night closed three public hearings on various aspects of the new firehouse proposed for Shepard Road. The commission okayed a plan to excavate materials on the site but decided to discuss the facility plan and a proposed lot line change that would trim a 45-foot-wide strip of land off City Meadow at its March 12 meeting. 

The P&Z has been accumulating information about the firehouse proposal since November. The plan calls for the fire department to retain its current firehouse while a second, larger building is constructed on the western portion of the lot. 

The lot line change, which amends the City Meadow special permit, is needed to allow the building to be constructed on the tight lot, but it would also change the usage of the land. Some members wanted to further discuss allowing a generator and transformer on that parcel.

Included with the application is a map dating from 1988, provided by the Town Clerk, that shows the strip of land in question was proposed back then for use by the fire department. Riiska said he did not know what the reasoning was 36 years ago. “One could speculate,” he said, “but they put everyone on notice by filing this map that this parcel was proposed for use by the fire department.”

Later, however, the parcel was included in City Meadow when that special permit was granted in 2021. Riiska said the lot line change would, in effect, change that special permit. 

In response to a question about who would maintain the City Meadow parking area and the walkway across the strip of land leading to it, Riiska said all the land belongs to the town and it will maintain it.

Turning their attention to the proposed plan for the firehouse, commissioners had few remaining questions. Some discussion centered on lighting levels around the firehouse, with P&Z member Jordan Stern saying the lights around the Town Hall are 3,000 lumens, while some of the proposed lights at the firehouse are brighter at 7,000 lumens. He also questioned what the low-wattage lights on the proposed boardwalk would look like. 

Stern noted that there are existing light poles on the firehouse lot and asked if they would be removed when new ones are installed. Will Walter of Benesch, the engineer for the project, said streetlights will be left in place but those on the lot would be replaced by modern lighting. The firefighters will determine the amount of light they need on the lot when the construction is finished. “We won’t know what it will look like until they are using the lot,” he said.

The firefighters have argued that they intend to be good neighbors but stress that they need enough light so they are safe when working there or responding to fires.

Use of the siren on the firehouse was questioned and the firefighters said that it is sounded daily to test it because it is a public safety alarm. It cycles once, which takes about one minute. It is also used for fire calls, of which there were approximately 115 last year, amounting to about 120 aggregate minutes over the course of 12 months.

The final hearing, on excavation of earth products, lasted only minutes. Walter explained that the lot slopes so levels will have to be adjusted to create a flat surface for the floor of the firehouse. About 1,200 cubic yards of onsite soil will be pushed around and another 1,300 cubic yards of fill will be imported. Approximately 850 cubic yards of demolition debris will be removed when the old firehouse is dismantled.

He predicted that 20 to 25 truckloads would be needed to remove the material and that the excavation work would be relatively short. 

“The whole project will take up to a year,” he said, “but the site prep might be a month or two.”

About six to eight trucks could be expected to enter and exit the lot on any given day.

The excavation application was approved without demur. 

Commission Chairman Tom Fahsbender suggested that deliberations on the primary application—the site plan—be deferred for a month to allow members to think about potential conditions that might be imposed. 

A motion was made to approve the lot line change, but that was withdrawn because of concerns about whether its approval would include all the infrastructure provisions as well.  

—Newsletter Editor

It’s a confusing world out there these days. Even plants, arguably the most rooted of the Earth’s denizens, can be baffled by our changing environment, with balmy temperatures teasing them into emerging too soon, only to be hit by freezing blasts that frost their tender shoots. But the USDA, which just updated its Plant Hardiness Zone Map for the first time since 2012, thinks it has some answers.

The horticultural season is already underway—if you count the flood of catalogs clogging mailboxes, enticing the gardeners who peruse them in eager anticipation. But what plants will fit into our changing environment? Which of the delightful confections brightening the catalog pages will thrive in our yards?

The new Plant Hardiness Zone Map shows Northwest Connecticut now falls in Zone 6, where average winter lows can be expected to be between five and 10 degrees below zero. This is considerably warmer than its previous designation as 5, where lows of 20 degrees below zero were possible.

For gardeners, this shift might seem modest, but it carries considerable implications, especially in how it relates to the year’s first frost. Knowing when to expect that first frost—which often freezes and kills plants—is vital for deciding when to bring vulnerable plants indoors or when to prepare the garden for the changing season. 

But a word of caution is in order. Nash Pradhan of Ginger Creek Nursery, a horticulturalist with more than 40 years of experience in Norfolk’s chilly climes, says he advises against “pushing the envelope” when using the new hardiness map to choose perennials. 

“Norfolk is different because of all its microclimates,” he cautioned. “I’m not going to change anything. I will plant the same perennials, the same trees.”

The key to successfully raising plants is selecting the right plant for the right location and planting it correctly, he continued. “It depends on your location. What kind of exposure do you have? Are you in a valley? Are you near water?”

He now exclusively plants native plants, which have a high survival rate because they have adapted and thrived under local conditions for millennia. “I will not plant invasives or potentially invasive plants,” he said. “Burning bush has beautiful fall foliage, but it is so invasive that I removed mine 20 years ago and I still find seedlings in the woods.”

He admits that there is uncertainty about what the warming temperatures will mean in future years. “There are some rare plants that grow here. Will they disappear? We don’t know,” he said. 

The rising temperatures have lengthened his season. “Things have certainly changed,” he observed. “There is almost no frost in the ground this year. I was still planting until the first week in January, when my season usually ends in late October or early November.”

But while the winter has delivered unusually warm weather, plants can still be affected by the variable temperatures. That late February day when he offered his insights to this reporter temperatures hovered around the 5-degree mark. And the lack of snow in recent years is also problematic as snow insulates plant roots, allowing them to withstand lower temperatures.

He suggested that gardeners who want guidance about what plants would do well in their landscapes consult with the Berkshire Botanical Gardens  in Stockbridge, Mass., which offers a number of informative classes, or contact the UConn Home & Garden Education Center.

—Newsletter Editor

Norfolk is known as the Icebox of Connecticut, but this winter has felt more like March. March is when bears begin to emerge from their winter dens, but this year the shaggy bruins have been rushing the season, making their presence known in early February.

One South Norfolk resident recently found footprints in the snow that pointed to a bear as the culprit behind her ruined bird feeder. 

But is this normal? Has the warm winter thrown off their sleep cycle, and can they thrive if they emerge before there is adequate food?

Don’t worry, says Melissa Ruszczyk, a wildlife biologist with the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. “When they go into torpor, their bodies just slow down, their metabolism and breathing slow, and their body temperature drops. They are fully capable of living off their fat reserves for four to six months.”  

Prior to going into torpor, bears enter hyperphagia, increasing feeding activity to fatten up. “They can require up to 20,000 calories a day,” said Ruszczyk. Those calories are supplied by foods such as acorns, hickory nuts, beechnuts and black walnuts. “They eat the heavy fats and pack on a lot of weight,” she said. 

Fat and happy, they look around for a den, which may be a recess in rocks, a slash pile or a nest created at the base of a tree. They may even choose to den under a deck or shed if there is a ready supply of food nearby.   

Ruszczyk said their bodies become highly efficient factories producing their own nutrients. 

“True hibernators wake up every couple of days for water and have different things they collect and keep in their dens. But a bear can lie there and live off its fat. It doesn’t defecate or urinate—they recycle waste as proteins. There’s almost no muscle atrophy and they can get up at the snap of twig and run if they need to,” she explained.

Getting up for a snack does not mean they will want to stay up. Such behavior may be more common where there is the hope of human-related food, she reported, but in more rural areas a couple of 50- or 60-degree days may not cause them to stir.

Females are more likely to remain in their dens because their babies are born in January, and they will not leave them. “They probably won’t come out until late March or early April because the cubs can’t keep up with mom. She might move them a couple of yards because she’s hungry, but she won’t leave them until they can climb a tree.” 

So, does a bear who has put in a restless winter feel grumpy in the spring? Ruszczyk said that bears have acclimated to human society and are unlikely to launch an unprovoked attack. “Bears view people differently than dogs,” she said. “Dogs are a concern. We have reports of people saying their dog treed a bear and they think it’s funny. It’s not. You were lucky your dog wasn’t hurt or killed. Dogs are protectors and they will rush a bear.”

Bears living near neighborhoods do not generally fear humans. ““That’s not to say they couldn’t attack a human, but they are becoming habituated,” said Ruszczyk. “They have a good sense of hearing and smell and, generally, they are fully capable of getting away. They usually don’t have a reason to fear us.”

Habituation is “not good for our bears or good for the public,” she said, adding that people should be alert for warning signs that a bear is becoming annoyed. “She might sit at the base of a tree and make huffing noises and slap the ground,” Ruszczyk said. “I would think anyone would know that is a warning.”

Ruszczyk is not an advocate of feeding wildlife at any time. The vast majority of bear conflicts result from improperly stored trash or bird feeders. To help restrain bird feeding, there is a statewide ban on intentionally feeding dangerous wildlife and nine Connecticut towns have ordinances forbidding behavior that attracts bears.

The Connecticut bear population is heaviest in western Connecticut, but 165 out of 169 towns reported sightings in 2023. At present, there is plenty of natural forage for bears in western Connecticut but, because the population is larger here, there are more frequent and closer conflicts between humans and bears—including 35 home entries in 2023.

“There are monetary issues with home entries,” Ruszczyk said. “Often there is food loss and the cost of cleaning up. I would say we have biological carrying capacity in Litchfield County, but we have reached our cultural carrying capacity and we could sustain a hunt. Hunting is a piece of the puzzle, but it isn’t the whole thing. It’s about managing people, too.”

Hunting has been weighed by the state legislature, but to date, the only provision is for the removal of nuisance bears. DEEP launched Be Bear Aware last year, a campaign using billboards and digital media messages to reduce conflicts by addressing food habituation. As bears begin to emerge from hibernation, the Be Bear Aware will ramp up again.

—Newsletter Editor

CTEC Solar, a Bloomfield-based company, is preparing to install infrastructure for a 13-acre solar array at the Norfolk Transfer Station.

“They have already done the survey and cleared the trees,” said First Selectman Matt Riiska. “Now they are clearing away the stumps and getting ready to build the array.” He predicted installation will begin in late spring or early summer.

New Jersey Resources, that state’s equivalent of Eversource, has leased the land from the town and will pay the community $40,000 a year. The proposal was passed at a town meeting two years ago.

Riiska said that residents’ experience of using the landfill will not change. “When they drive in the entrance it will look the same,” he said. “There is still a buffer along the road and in summer you won’t see the panels.” 

The solar array will encircle the transfer station, but Riiska said there is no danger of the town not having enough land for its own purposes. “We don’t need more room,” he said. “We have cleared an area for people to put brush and debris and we have an area for compost. We have plenty of land. We will just get $40,000 a year for land we can’t use.”

He said New Jersey Resources is responsible for all costs and permitting and will have to maintain the trees around the site to prevent any of them falling on the equipment. 

—Newsletter Editor

The Farmers Market Committee recently discussed the future role of the market in the community and decided to focus on the community garden behind Botelle School as its primary mission, offering children an educational opportunity for growing and learning about food.

The committee took over stewardship of the gardens last May. 

Members said they would confer with school officials to determine how they can collaborate with Botelle School and Chairman Lisa Auclair is to confer with the agriculture department at Northwestern Regional School #7 to discuss working with its students again this year.

“At our meeting, we ran through many different ideas for how we can integrate the ag department students as well as the kids that attend Botelle in growing, harvesting and selling or producing food items for sale this year,” said Auclair. “We are still very much in the development stages, but very excited about the prospects.”

Last year she set up four work parties with the ag students to prepare the community garden for planting. Two to four students joined Auclair each time, as did committee members and some neighbors, to help weed, clean out the shed, move mulch for the space between the beds, repair the beds and to replenish them with fresh soil and plantings.

Auclair said that last year the committee bought a quantity of plants from the Region 7 agriculture program, which has a large greenhouse and sells plants in the spring for reasonable rates. The Farmers Market Committee also sold some of agriculture department’s plants and flowers at the weekly farmers markets.

Each agriculture student must put in four hours of community service per quarter for credit in the FFA. A couple of the girls also volunteered during the Farmers market Kids Day event last summer, handing out popcorn, running games and assisting in selling produce grown in the garden.

Instead of weekly markets on the Town Hall grounds this summer, three pop-up markets are planned: the first at Botelle School on February 24 during Winter Weekend in Norfolk, a second in early August, during the summer version of WIN, and one at Christmas during the December Holiday Market. Locations and exact dates for the latter two have not been determined.

Twenty vendors have rented spaces for the February 24th market and the PTO will cater food. Music will be provided by Andy Styles.

The future of the Farmers Market was thrown into question last fall when, after 17 years at the helm, committee chairman Lisa Auclair announced her desire to step down. Market manager Angie Bollard also announced her retirement. In December, however, local resident Chelsea Ryll stepped forward and offered to manage the pop-ups. In turn, Auclair agreed to serve another year as chairman and Bollard joined the committee.

— Newsletter Editor