Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Community Celebration

The Archer Memorial A.M.E. Zion Church is sponsoring its annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Celebration for the Windsor Community.  This event will take place on Monday, January 16, 2006, starting at 6:00 PM in the Windsor Town Hall Council Chambers, 275 Broad Street.  The guest speaker will be Dr. Gilbert Bond, former Professor of Black Theology at Yale University, New Haven, CT.  Donations from this event will be used to assist college bound students via the David A. Gaither Scholarship Fund.  Scholarship applications are available to high school seniors in Windsor and may be obtained by calling the Archer Memorial A.M.E. Zion Church office at 688-5225.  This event is open to the public and all are welcome.

Public Work Shop Regarding Facility Use Scheduled

The community is invited to a Community Work Shop regarding the development of a Town of Windsor facility use study will be held Wednesday, January 11, 2006 in the cafeteria at Windsor High School from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM.

Windsor Public Building Commission has selected Drummey Rosane Anderson, Inc., an architecture and planning design firm, with an office in Windsor, to prepare the study.  They have started the programming and building evaluation and will be ready for the first of two Community Work Shops on the night of Wednesday, January 11. 

This project takes two previous studies, one for the Senior Center at L.P. Wilson and one for all-day kindergarten and combines them with a mix of other buildings that could be impacted or utilized for several different uses. It will then match these buildings or new buildings with programs for seniors, recreation and Milo Peck programs. This will help ensure appropriate uses for town buildings and will include several different scenarios ranging from “do nothing concept” to adding new buildings to our inventory.

For more information, call 285-1870.

Fire Fatality

I am saddened by the death of Judith Garrity that occurred yesterday.  This is a tragic incident.  My thoughts and prayers are with her family and friends. 

Questions regarding the response time have been raised.  The first engine arrived at the scene within 6 minutes of the emergency dispatch.   Individual firefighters and police officers were on the scene prior to the first engine.  Firefighters were able to contain the fire to one room with heat, smoke and water damage to adjacent areas.

Fire prevention efforts through public education, strong code enforcement and promotion of smoke detectors and fire sprinklers along with a Fire Department comprised of well trained, dedicated and committed volunteers have helped make Windsor a safer community.  This is the first fire fatality in Windsor since 1998.  

The issue of volunteer versus career or paid fire department was also raised.  This topic is one that many communities have or will have to face in the coming years.

At this juncture the Fire Department is adequately staffed.  As we have discussed in the past, Chief Lewis and his command staff have and continue to recruit and retain volunteers – especially with an eye towards weekday coverage.

I also would like to emphasis that fire prevention efforts are critical to saving lives and reducing property damage.  One tool that has been used effectively is the installation of smoke detectors.  A second tool is the installation of fire sprinkler systems.  It has been well documented that sprinklers in both residential and non-residential structures help save lives and mitigate property loss.   Over the years the town has been very aggressive in requiring sprinklers in new or renovated commercial and industrial structures as well as age restricted residential dwellings.  I believe it is time to review the potential expansion of this effort to cover all new residential dwellings as well as possibly providing incentives for existing homes to be outfitted with sprinklers. 

I have asked staff to prepare material regarding current state laws, regulations and building codes relative to our ability to require sprinklers in new homes as well as provide incentives to homeowners to install sprinklers in existing homes.