Regional hazardous waste collection slated April 18 in Waterbury

 

Hazardous waste collection slated for region at Naugatuck Transfer Station

The first Household Hazardous Waste Day event for this year will be held April 12 at the Naugatuck Transfer Station, from 8 a.m.-2 p.m.

All Ansonia residents are eligible to participate in the multi-town event.

Shared from City of Ansonia Facebook page.

TEAM posts Toys 4 Kids toy collection locations in region

Announcing our first TEAM Toys 4 Kids 2024 Collection Sites in the community!

Stop by any one of these locations to drop off a toy to donate to children in need!

Want to join the list and Make Magic Happen? Send us your business info here and we will get you a collection box! https://forms.gle/qGyRZ1C6bTFmAiHd8

This is shared from TEAM's Facebook page.

Household hazardous waste collection slated Saturday in Woodbury

 

Household hazardous waste collection slated at Wolcott PW

 

TEAM posts partial list of Toys 4 Kids drop-off sites in area

These are just some of our TEAM Toys 4 Kids drop-off sites around our region! 

It really takes us all coming together to Make Magic Happen for over 2,000 children in our community. 

Please consider dropping off a new, unwrapped toy at one of these collection locations by Dec. 7.

This is shared from TEAM's Facebook page.

Southbury to host hazardous waste, paint collection for region Saturday

The Town of Southbury will be hosting the next Hazardous Waste Day, Saturday, July 24, from 8 a.m.-2 p.m. 

For those wishing to attend, please follow the instructions on the attached flyer. 

The address is: Southbury Town Hall, 501 Main St. South, Southbury.

This is shared from the City of Ansonia Facebook page.

Ansonia to hold household hazardous waste, paint collection for area communities

 

Talk at Kellogg Center in Derby to highlight Native American Heritage Month

DERBY - Connecticut’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection invites you to attend a presentation by Lucianne Lavin, PhD, Director of Research and Collections, Institute for American Indian Studies at 7 p.m. Nov. 1. 

The presentation will be held at Kellogg Environmental Center, 500 Hawthorne Ave.  

November is Native American Heritage Month.

Lavin’s presentation, “Connecticut's Indigenous Communities and their Natural World,” will explore Connecticut’s indigenous communities and educate participants in the rich histories that extend back to the time they shared Mother Earth with mastodons and other extinct animals. 
DEEP invites all ages to attend and learn about Connecticut’s native communities and regional history.

Through thousands of years and as a necessity for their physical survival, Native Americans became experts in their natural environments. New England was not a “wilderness,” as described by the early English settlers, but a built landscape. Our first environmental stewards, Native American communities, had long been managing their physical environments to enhance plant and animal populations. 

Lavin will help participants explore these connections through Indigenous folklore and sacred stories promoting stewardship.

Lavin is an anthropologist and archaeologist who has over 40 years of research and field experience in Northeastern archaeology and anthropology.  

Her career includes teaching, museum exhibits and curatorial work, cultural resource management, editorial work, and public relations.

Lavin is a founding member of the state’s Native American Heritage Advisory Council and editor of the Journal of the Archaeological Society of Connecticut.  She received her M.A. and Ph.D. in anthropology from New York University and her B.A. from Indiana University. Lavin has written over 150 professional publications and technical reports on the archaeology and ethno-history of the Northeast. Her award-winning book, Connecticut’s Indigenous Peoples: What Archaeology, History and Oral Traditions Teach Us about their Communities and Cultures, was published by Yale University Press (spring 2013).

The program is offered free of charge; donations are accepted. Call the Center at 203-734-2513 or email donna.kingston@ct.gov to register or for information or directions. 

This is a press release from Connecticut DEEP.

Updated Valley profile report now available

Naugatuck Valley Council of Governments staff recently completed an update to the Regional Profile for the 19 municipalities comprising the region.

The Regional Profile compiles population, economic, and housing data from a variety of sources, including the U.S. Census Bureau, the Connecticut Department of Labor, and the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development.  

This report provides useful statistical data to public officials, local organizations, developers, private citizens, students, businesses, and others interested in population, housing and economic trends. NVCOG staff prepares an update each year.  

The data is intended to assist municipalities with grant applications, updates to planning and economic development documents, and provide information to local boards and commissions. An analysis and overview of important regional trends is found in the beginning of the report.  

More detailed tables and maps showing information for each municipality are found in the appendices.

As a supplement to the Regional Profile, NVCOG staff has created an interactive web-based application to provide access to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey data at the block group or block level. This tool allows users to obtain statistics for smaller areas within a municipality.

The Regional Profile report and web-based application can found on NVCOG’s website, www.nvcogct.org

“Just as the State of Connecticut is very diverse as a whole, the NVCOG region demonstrates considerable diversity in demographic data, which the Regional Profile summarizes well,” NVCOG GIS Program Coordinator Glenda Prentiss said. “Providing supplemental access to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey data at the block group or block level is a new feature that offers the opportunity to provide even more specific data.”  

This is a press release from the Naugatuck Valley Council of Governments. 

Derby mayor honors Valley veterinarian for service to community

Derby Mayor Anita Dugatto, center, presents a plaque to Dr. Tara C. Nanavati at City Hall. His wife, Dwarka Nanavati, is at right. Nanavati recently was honored for his 35 years of service to the community./Contributed photo 

DERBY - The City of Derby recently congratulated Dr. Tara C. Nanavati for providing more than 35 years of service to the Valley community and its animals in need.  
Mayor Anita Dugatto presented a plaque to Nanavati, who also received similar awards from the Seymour and Oxford Boards of Selectmen last year.

Nanavati, who operates a veterinarian hospital in a building on the Ansonia-Seymour line, is credited with many pet and wild animal rescues throughout his years of service. 

He has helped many of the region's animal shelters and animal control officers, run rabies clinics with proceeds donated to charitable causes, including St. Michael’s Church in Derby, the Methodist Church in Seymour after a devastating fire, the Woodbridge Dog Pound, and the Ansonia Nature and Recreation Center. 

During the past five years, Nanavati has taken on charitable work that extends well beyond the region. 

In 2010, he collected 3,000 pounds of medical supplies, clothing, bedsheets, shoes, and toiletries for the survivors of the earthquake in Haiti. 
In 2011, he followed up with a collection for the Japan Tsunami victims, and he helped with settlement of Nepalese refugees in the region. 

In late August 2013, he completed another clothing and personal item collection to benefit survivors of the Oklahoma tornadoes that killed 23 people and injured nearly 400 in May of that year. 

Nanavati has operated his practice since 1988 at 876 South Main St. in Seymour. 

An Orange resident, he is joined at his practice these days by his wife, Dwarka Nanavati, and by Becky Mahon, a veterinary assistant who has been a staple at the animal hospital for more than eight years. 

Mahon said there are numerous adult cats and kittens available for adoption; call 203-735-9915 for more information. 

  

When asked what he plans to do, now that he has completed 35 years of service, Nanavati said he will try to make it to 40 years, since there is always an animal, and a community, in need.    

This is a press release from Nanavati's office.

DeLauro backs Lockheed plan to purchase Sikorsky

WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro, D-CT, released the following statement today after the Department of Defense announced concerns with mergers and acquisitions between prime contractors, such as Lockheed Martin and Sikorsky (Aircraft). 

DeLauro represents Sikorsky’s home of Stratford.

“Lockheed Martin is the right home for Sikorsky. Lockheed Martin does not presently make helicopters, and they are committed to both the military and commercial helicopter business. I look forward to seeing Lockheed’s $9 billion purchase of Sikorsky go through and the world’s best helicopters continue to be built in Stratford.”

This is a press release from DeLauro's office.  

State commission to host hearing on transit issues in Derby

DERBY - The Connecticut Public Transportation Commission will hold a public hearing at 7 p.m. Sept. 9 at City Hall, 1 Elizabeth St. 

This will be the first of four hearings that the Commission holds statewide this fall to gather testimony from the public, transportation providers, public officials and other entities concerning the operation of public transportation services, dial-a-ride and ADA transportation and other issues.  

The Commission seeks public comment on the extent to which existing services are meeting public needs and on improvements or new services to address unmet travel needs.  

Local and regional issues of particular interest include service on the Waterbury Branch of Metro-North, the lack of evening and weekend bus service in the Lower Naugatuck Valley, limited transit options in communities between Derby and Waterbury, the Valley Transit District’s bus service, the Naugatuck River Greenway, and other topics of interest to the public.

The Commission will use the testimony received at this public hearing as well as from other hearings conducted across the state in preparing recommendations for its annual report to the Governor, the Commissioner of Transportation and the Transportation Committee of the General Assembly. 

In addition, the Commission’s other fall public hearings will be Sept. 30 in Old Saybrook at the Old Saybrook Town Hall, Oct. 6 at Windsor Locks Town Hall, and Oct. 13 in Stamford at the Western Connecticut Council of Governments office in the Stamford Government Center, all at 7 p.m. 
The Commission  held three hearings this spring in Norwich, Hamden, and Plainville.



This is a press release from the Connecticut Public Transportation Commission.

Seymour now equipped with emergency animal shelter

Sharing from the Facebook page of the Office of the First Selectman:
"Seymour is now home to this mobile emergency animal shelter [pictured above]. This regional asset will provide support for several local communities but will be staged in Seymour. This unit carries bulk quantities of cages, food and water bowls and snares. Use of this equipment at shelters will be managed by our CERT team with training programs provided by the Region/State."