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First Selectman Community Update- August 7, 2020

Posted on: August 7, 2020 - 3:55pm

Dear Stonington Residents,

Hope you are all doing well. Please find below a range of updates that we thought you all might find of interest. Please email us with ideas and feedback on what other topics you would like to see covered in this communication.

August 11, 2020 Primaries: Our Register of Voters and Town Clerk’s office have been busy working on the primaries. It is quite amazing to see how much work goes on behind the scenes to enable us in having our right to vote. For those who can vote in the primaries please do!

We are looking for students 16 and older to work at the polls on August 11th. There will be shifts from 6:00 am - 1:00 pm and 1:00 pm - 8:00 pm. Workers will be paid $90, and will have the opportunity to be a part of the election process. Sign-up for a shift: www.signupgenius.com/go/20f0444aaa62da3f85-student. Questions, contact klinehan@stonington-ct.gov or janice.lamb@stoningtonschools.org.

As a reminder, polling places for the Town of Stonington are:

  • District 1   Stonington Fire House, 100 Main St., Stonington
  • District 2   Former Pawcatuck Middle School, 40 Field St., Pawcatuck **
  • District 3   Deans Mill School, 35 Deans Mill Rd., Stonington
  • District 4   B. F. Hoxie Engine Co., Mystic Fire Dept., 34 Broadway Ave., Mystic
  • District 5  (former) School Administration Building, 49 No. Stonington Rd, Old Mystic                                                                   

** Please note, the District 2 is at a new location. It has moved from the Pawcatuck Fire Station to the former Pawcatuck Middle School (Current School Dept District Office).

Reminder regarding Absentee Ballots:

To ensure that your ballot will be received on time, please place your ballot into both the inner and out envelopes and place your ballot into the secure drop box located in your municipality.  Once deposited in the secure drop box your ballot is considered received by your municipality. Your ballot should be deposited in the secure drop box no later than 8 p.m. on August 11, 2020. Stonington’s drop box is located at the foot of the steps at Stonington Town Hall.

Tropical Storm: While we were very fortunate in Stonington compared to other Town’s around the state, we know for many who are still without power there is understandable frustration. Eversource has more than 1,000 crews deployed today and more on the way. As of this morning 526,834 customers have been restored and approximately 414,000 customers remain without service. Eversource estimates storm restoration will be substantially complete by 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, August 11, 2020, with many customers being restored sooner. The outage map can be found here, along with other relevant links for Eversource related information. https://outagemap.eversource.com/external/default.html. We are also extremely grateful to our Department of Public Works, Police, Fire and all those who have helped during and after the storm.

Stonington Human Services and Rec: In an effort to get our kids outside and having fun while being SAFE and playing by the rules, Stonington Recreation is hosting Camper Time Clubs. Most of the hour (+) long programs will have a minimum and maximum # of participants available on a first come/first served basis. Instructors and participants must follow all proper social-distancing protocols. Online registration is available at: https://stonington.recdesk.com.  There is also a horseback riding and soccer camp being offered, and don’t forget HIKE Stonington is another free and healthy program available to all year round, read more on all three here: https://stonington.recdesk.com/Community/Page?pageId=9496

Stonington Beautification: There are many areas in Stonington that need to be cleaned up and many ways you can help!  The Stonington Community Clean-up is an ongoing project that is run by a group of wonderful volunteers. If you can take 20 -60 minutes out of your busy week it would be most appreciated- also share with friends and family! If you go out please take a photo and post on social media and tag in @Stonington Beautification Committee.

All you need is to wear a bright shirt, bring gloves and carry a bucket or small garbage bag. Please, choose a safe road, neighborhood or Downtown area anywhere in our community. Most importantly is to please be safe. Starting a cleanup in the early morning is highly recommended, as there is less traffic to worry about.  

Another option is to send in a photo and location if you know of an area in Stonington that is state or town property that needs some TLC. Email: stoningtonbeautification@stonington-ct.gov

RI and COVID-19: We were working early this week with our state contacts and LLHD to get further consideration and clarity on how border Town’s can work with the travel requirements since RI was added to the affected state list. You can read more on this here, but in summary as long as people are not staying in RI for more than 24 hours you do not need to quarantine upon returning to CT. So, if you work in RI, have your doctors or other reasons you need to be in RI, please take all necessary precautions, but know you are legally allowed to do so as long as you stay for less than 24 hours.   

COVID-19 and CT: In Stonington there are 38 confirmed cases, ages 14-96. For the 10 Towns that LLHD covers, there are a total of 919 cases, with 10 new cases this week and 18 the prior week.  As of August 5, 2020, looking at the State data for all of New London county we have 1,369 confirmed cases and 4 hospitalizations. The State overall had 66 hospitalizations, which is an increase of seven from the previous day. Looking back at the past 30 days, the state hospitalization low was 53 and the highest was 90.

COVID-19 and Schools: The Board of Education will meet on August 13 to likely vote on the final back-to-school plan for September. Earlier this week the State of CT shared that they are working on making town by town risk metrics available, but in the meantime visit this link for most up-to-date data (on the left click on CT):  https://globalepidemics.org/key-metrics-for-covid-suppression/. The State officials noted on a call that they considered under 10 (for daily new cases per 100k people) was low risk, moderate was 10-25 and high is over 25.

If you have questions, ideas or concerns please call, email or make a time to meet in person. Hope you all have a safe and happy weekend. Please help us remind people to wear masks whenever inside, or when 6 feet is not possible outside. Our numbers in CT remain low and we need your help to keep them this way.

Warm regards,

Danielle Chesebrough, Stonington First Selectman