In this email you'll find updates on district resources and news. Please click the links below to read the section that corresponds with the highlighted headline.
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From my family to yours, I want to take a moment to send my best wishes for the holiday season, and express that it is my sincere honor to represent you and work on issues that matter to our community and Connecticut.
Remember that as we celebrate, we also share many blessings, so in the spirit of the season, please spread joy and make these holidays truly special. I hope the holidays bring you peace, happiness and good health today, tomorrow, in the New Year, and beyond it.
Manchester Adult and Continuing Education
Thank you to Manchester Adult and Continuing Education for inviting me as your guest speaker to welcome students and families to the second trimester.
Squire Village Food Pantry Dinner
Thank you, Pastor Richie, Vivilyn Smith, and the Miracle World Outreach Ministry for your tireless effort toward creating the Squire Village food pantry, and hosting a great Holiday dinner.
Legislative Updates
Legislative Town Halls
Please join me and my colleagues as we host our pre-session town halls. Town hall events are opportunities to listen to and talk directly about what matters most to you.
I hope to see you there!
As we ring in the new year, there are some laws that become effective on January 1 that were passed during the 2023 legislative session addressing key issue areas including early voting, health and mental health, and online privacy and data protection.
There will also be an increase in the minimum wage effective January 1 from $15.00 to $15.69 made possible through legislation passed in 2019, which implemented five incremental increases in the minimum wage followed by future adjustments that are tied to the percentage change in the federal employment cost index.
Although extensive, below I share some highlights, and a link to the complete list. Please feel free to share and reach out to my office if you would like more detail on any of the new laws.
Establishes a framework for early, in-person voting requiring a 14-day early voting period for general elections, a seven-day period for most primaries, and a four-day early voting period for special elections and presidential preference primaries.
Establishes a new license category for freestanding birth centers, an Infant Mortality Relief Program to review medical records and other data on infant deaths and a midwifery working group to study and make recommendations on advancing choices for community birth care.
ONLINE PRIVACY, DATA AND SAFETY PROTECTIONS (PA 23-56)
Makes various changes to laws on data privacy and related issues, including provisions on consumer health data, minors’ social media accounts and online services, online dating operators, and a task force on internet crimes against children.
Among many supportive measures, creates a plan to establish a Transitional Life Skills College program to support certain people with IDD who are transitioning out of high school or to independent living.
Your calls, emails, and testimony at public hearings during the legislative session had a direct influence on these new laws. Thank you for your input, and please continue sharing your views and making your voice heard during our legislative process.
Today In History
While the Industrial Revolution forever changed the way Americans manufactured, bought, and sold everyday goods, fewer inventions had a larger impact on home life for American families than the sewing machine. While there had been several experimental and industrial models of sewing machines in existence since the earliest years of the 19th century, smaller domestic models didn’t hit the American market in earnest until the 1840s and 1850s — thanks largely to improvements by Connecticut innovators who collectively had a huge impact on the sewing machine industry.
One of many late 19th-century Wheeler & Wilson ads, marketing their sewing machines as “family friendly.”
Nathaniel Wheeler and Allen B. Wilson, whose patented sewing machines dominated the global market during the latter half of the 19th century, were one such set of innovators. Nathaniel Wheeler, born in Watertown, Connecticut in 1820, was a businessman who jumped at the chance to partner with inventor Allen Wilson after he had seen one of Wilson’s unique sewing machines on display in New York City in 1851. Two years later, they established the Wheeler & Wilson Manufacturing Company in Watertown, where they began mass-producing Wilson’s patented sewing machines and marketing them, with remarkable success, to middle-class American men and women.
The mechanically-gifted Wilson acquired a number of significant sewing machine design patents. None were more impactful than the patent awarded to him on December 19, 1854 for a “four-motion cloth-feeding sewing machine.” This implemented a method of automatically feeding fabric into the sewing machine that allowed for curved stitching — a method so revolutionary that Wheeler & Wilson’s competitors scrambled to implement similar techniques in their machines. Wilson’s automatic-feeding method remains virtually unchanged to this day, even in modern-day electronic sewing machines.
An illustration of the Wheeler & Wilson manufacturing complex in Bridgeport, Connecticut in 1863, from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper.
Wheeler & Wilson’s marketing campaigns — advertising the ease, speed, and “family friendliness” of their sewing machines — were so successful that the company soon outgrew their Watertown headquarters. In 1856, Wheeler & Wilson set up shop in Bridgeport in what would eventually become a massive, sprawling, 15-acre campus of manufacturing buildings. By 1870, the company had won several international awards for the design and ease-of-use of its sewing machines, and was selling over 100,000 of them annually, making Wheeler and Wilson millionaires. Not long after the deaths of the company’s innovative founders in 1888 and 1893, however, the Wheeler & Wilson company was bought out by its biggest rival, the Singer Sewing Machine Company. By the earliest years of the 20th century, the Wheeler & Wilson brand name had vanished from American store shelves — but not before the two Connecticut men had changed the sewing machine industry forever.
Manchester
Please arrive early to be in line for 9:00 am as the truck leaves promptly at 9:30 am. Open to the public--bring a sturdy grocery bag! This program is made possible by Foodshare and Winn Residential - Resident Service Program. For more information call 860-646-1280.
Squire Village, 48 Spencer Street, 06040 (1st parking lot off Imperial Drive #78)
Get mobile pantry updates in your area by texting the word Foodshare to 85511.
East Hartford
The Connecticut Foodshare truck will be in the parking lot to distribute the food. Please bring your bags and be prepared to possibly wait in line.
Mayberry Village –St. Isaac Jogues Church Parking Lot (41 Home Terrace East Hartford)
Monday, December 25th, 2023 12:30 PM-1:15 PM (Canceled)
Get mobile pantry updates in your area by texting the word Foodshare to 85511.
The Town of Manchester mailed Supplemental Motor Vehicle tax bills for the October 2022 Grand List on December 15, 2023.
The second installment of taxes on the Grand List of October 01, 2022 and the Supplemental Motor Vehicle List are due and payable on January 01, 2024.
Failure to pay any tax due January 01, 2024, on or before February 01, 2024, will cause the tax to become delinquent and subject to interest at the rate of 1.5% per month (minimum $2.00), back to the original due date of January 01, 2024.
The Department of Leisure, Family, and Recreation Winter/Spring Program and Event Guide is here!
CRCOG Gap Funding Available for Low
and Moderate-Income Families
CRCOG opened its application opportunity for Low to Moderate-Income families suffering from crumbling foundations to apply for additional remediation assistance. Rep. Joe Courtney, the Capitol Region Council of Governments (CRCOG), the Connecticut Foundations Solutions Indemnity Corporation (CFSIC), and the Northeast Connecticut Council of Governments (NECCOG) launched the new Crumbling Foundation Remediation and Restoration program to help low and moderate-income homeowners access financial assistance to repair damages caused by crumbling foundations.
Town Offices will be closed Monday, December 25, 2023 in observance of Christmas.
Please visit the Library, Recreation, andSanitation Dept. for information on their specific holiday schedules, including curbside trash and recycling schedules.
Parking Ban Starts December 1
Overnight parking is not allowed on public streets or municipal parking lots between the hours of 2:00 AM and 6:00 AM from December 1st to April 1st. Parked vehicles are one of the biggest obstacles to effective snow removal. Please support our efforts by parking your vehicle in conformance with the winter parking ban.
Anyone violating this ordinance shall be fined fifteen dollars ($15.00).
The Chief of Police may also declare a parking ban if a significant snow event is forecast or in progress. Residents are asked to remove vehicles from the street when a snowstorm is occurring.
Trails Enhancements and Connectivity Survey
On October 4, 2022, the Board of Directors authorized the establishment of a Temporary Committee on Trail Enhancements and Connectivity to develop a plan for Manchester’s trail network. The charge of the committee is as follows:
i. Allocate $300,000 of federal American Rescue Act Plan (ARPA) funds “for the purpose of acquiring parcels of land that improve or enhance the connection of accessibility of recreational trails,”
ii. Allocate $200,000 of federal American Rescue Act Plan (ARPA) funds to “maintain, upgrade, or otherwise enhance existing trails.
We want to hear from you! Please take a moment to take the survey and share your preferences and priorities on the proposed allocations.
Town of Manchester Invites Feedback on
Downtown Manchester Improvements Project Concept
As November rolls along the State’s attention turns to Downtown Manchester, home to the one-of-a-kind Manchester Road Race. Manchester is proud to host this wonderful annual event and welcome tens of thousands of runners, walkers, and supporters to our special Main Street. While the Road Race has Thanksgiving covered, the Town of Manchester continues exciting plans to make Downtown an even better place all year-round.
The Downtown Manchester Improvements Project (also known as the “Downtown Streetscape Project” or “Downtown for All”) is the next phase in the Town’s recent efforts to make Downtown and its adjacent neighborhoods more vibrant.
Leveraging a $7.5 million grant from the State of Connecticut that was awarded in March 2023, this project will represent a significant investment in Downtown that will benefit the entire community, complete necessary upgrades of the Main Street corridor, and address multiple community needs previously identified in various engagement efforts spanning the past decade.
The Downtown Manchester Improvements Project is in the planning stages, and over the next several months, the Town will be soliciting feedback and input from residents, business owners, and other stakeholders before finalizing the design. The current concept is based on years of public engagement and feedback efforts where the Town has gleaned crucial public input on opportunities and strategies for further improving Downtown. These efforts have included conducting a Town-wide survey collecting feedback on recent improvements, facilitating a strategic workshop to identify priorities, engaging with the Downtown Special Services District and the Manchester Road Race leadership, and gathering public input on Manchester NEXT (the update of the Town's 10-year Plan of Conservation & Development).
This project will put the Town’s “Complete Streets” policy into action, transforming the Main Street corridor between Center Street and Hartford Road into an accessible, vibrant, and equitable space through a comprehensive design that includes traffic and pedestrian/bicycle safety improvements, additional public spaces, and an enhanced streetscape complemented with strategic public and private development. The project aims to reduce the instances of serious vehicular crashes, slow vehicular speeds, increase foot traffic to local businesses, and increase the amount of accessible public space.
Moreover, Downtown needs improvements to its existing infrastructure and this plan will drive activity, private investment, visitors, residents, and new businesses to Main Street. Downtown is the heart of the Manchester community, and the Town is determined to help the district, its businesses and residents, thrive well into the future.
For more information about the plan concept, please visit : yvmmct.comto review project details, ask questions directly to the project team, review FAQs, and subscribe for project updates.
The next step for the project team is to collect more feedback and input that would further the design of this concept. The project team has already begun engagement with groups like the Downtown Special Services District, Manchester Youth Commission, Manchester Road Race Committee, Sustainability Commission, and others. There will be a number of additional opportunities coming soon. Please reach out to the project team via Your Voice Matters if you or your organization is interested in hearing more.
Contact: Emma Petersen, Principal Comprehensive Planner
Mondays through Fridays 3pm-6pm.
Saturdays & Sundays 1pm-5pm.
This event takes place through Saturday, December 23.
Enjoy an enchanted visit with Santa Claus, Mrs. Claus and the elves in the beautiful log cabin nestled at the highest point in the park!
This is a traditional, family friendly event. There are no sponsorships or commercialization of the event and it is free for everyone!
Stop at the elf desk to see if you’re on the naughty or nice list then head over to tell Santa how good you’ve been and what you want for Christmas. Don’t forget to visit Mrs. Claus to have some hot cocoa and a cookie!
Bring a non-perishable food item for the local food pantries. All donated in the name of the friends of Wickham Park.
Manchester Bicentennial
Manchester has launched planning efforts for its 2023 Bicentennial Celebration. This year long celebration will consist of a variety of opportunities to remember the past, celebrate the present, and dream about the future. Festivities will include historical and educational programs, special events, and commemorative projects.
East Hartford Parks and Recreation Offering
Winter Adult Classes
East Hartford Parks and Recreation continues to offer adult programming beginning in early January 2023.
Adult Aqua Zumba
Aqua Zumba will be held on Mondays and Thursday evenings from 5:30pm – 6:30pm at the East Hartford Middle School pool. The winter session will include 16 classes and is $64 for residents and non-residents. Classes will begin on Monday, January 8, 2024. Registration is required online at www.ehparks.org, and registration is open now for residents and non-residents. Class instructors are from Eliza’s Energy Source.
Adult Zumba and Yogalates
Adult Zumba and Yogalates will be held on Tuesday and Thursday evenings at the Sunset Ridge Middle School Gymnasium. Zumba will be from 6pm – 7pm and Yogalates will be from 7:15pm – 8pm. The winter session will include 20 classes and is $80 for residents and non-residents. Classes will begin on Tuesday, January 9, 2024. Registration is required online at www.ehparks.org, and registration is open now for residents and non-residents. Class instructors are from Eliza’s Energy Source.
East Hartford Parks and Recreation is offering two fun programs: Open Gym for East Hartford residents in Grades 7 through 12 and Adult Drop-In Basketball.
FREE-PLAY BASKETBALL
For Middle and High School students in grades 7 – 12
East Hartford residents or students attending East Hartford Middle or High School can participate in Basketball Open Gym on Mondays and Fridays. The program starts runs through Friday, March 8th from 6:30 – 8:45pm at East Hartford Middle School. Grade 7 and 8 will be in the Lower Gym and Grades 9 – 12 will be in the Upper Gym. The program is FREE, but all participants must be registered at www.ehparks.org and have a Town ID or EHHS/EHMS ID at the program. There will be no program if there is no school or school is let out early due to inclement weather.
ADULT OPEN BASKETBALL
For adults ages 18 & up
East Hartford Parks and Recreation is offering Adult Open Basketball at Goodwin Elementary School. All participants must complete a registration form the first evening they attend or register at www.ehparks.org for a season membership. The program is Monday and Thursday nights and will run through Thursday, March 7th. Residents can purchase a season pass for $20 or $2 an evening. Non-residents can purchase a Season Pass for $40 or $4 an evening. The program time is 6:30 to 9:30pm. Basketball sneakers are mandatory. There will be no program if there is no school or school is let out early due to inclement weather.
For more information, please call the Parks and Recreation office at 860-291-7160.
Officer Brian A. Aselton Memorial Snow Dash
WHAT: Officer Brian A. Aselton Memorial Snow Dash 5k Road Race
WHERE: Langford School, 61 Alps Drive
WHEN: Sunday, January 7, 2024
WHO: Town of East Hartford Parks & Recreation & East Hartford Police Department
East Hartford, CT - The Town of East Hartford is pleased to offer, the 31st running of the annual Officer Brian A. Aselton Memorial Snow Dash 5K Road Race, sponsored by the East Hartford Parks and Recreation Department and the East Hartford Police Department will be held on Sunday, January 7, 2024 at 1:30 PM. The race will start and finish at Langford School located at 61 Alps Drive. Over 200 runners are expected to participate in the race that is run in tribute to Officer Brian A. Aselton. Proceeds benefit the East Hartford Police Department Child Safety and Crime Prevention Programs and the Officer Brian Aselton Scholarship Fund. Commemorative award plaques will be awarded for 1st, 2nd and 3rd in each division for men and women. Divisions include 17 & under, 18-29, 30-39, 40-49, 50-59, 60-69, 70-79, and 80 & up. Discount Trophy generously provides the awards. Official race apparel is available race day.
On January 23, 1999, Police Officer Brian A. Aselton gave his life in the line of duty protecting the citizens of East Hartford. The tragic loss of Officer Aselton devastated the community. Officer Aselton was only 26 years old when his brilliant life was extinguished; yet, his spirit lives on in those who remember him. Proceeds from the race will benefit the Officer Brian A. Aselton Memorial Scholarship Fund and East Hartford Police Child Safety and Crime Prevention Programs. Since the inception of Brian’s scholarship fund 314 scholarships have been awarded.
Originally, the race was developed in 1993 to benefit the East Hartford Police Department’s Community Outreach Division. The Community Outreach Division operated youth programs throughout town in areas such as Veterans Terrace, Hockanum Park, Mayberry Village and East Hartford Estates. The race was renamed for Officer Aselton in 2000. In 2001, the Quality of Life Division took over these responsibilities. In 2005, Child Safety and Crime Prevention Programs became the race’s beneficiary. Hundreds of East Hartford children and teens annually participate in these programs.
To register for the race online, follow this link:
WHO: Anyone who is 55 or older and resides in the Town of East Hartford & their guests
WHAT: Senior Prom Dinner Dance
WHEN: Thursday January 25th at 5:30 pm
WHERE: 15 Milbrook Drive, East Hartford
East Hartford, CT—The East Hartford Senior Center invites you to a Senior Prom Dinner Dance. Dress to Impress for a Raffle Ticket to be named King & Queen of the Prom and receive a prize.
Menu: Chicken Cordon Bleu, Baked Potato & Green Bean Amandine. With a chocolate éclair for dessert. Coffee, tea and water will be available.
Musical Performance by JCDC Band. A great band that has music that is fun, performed by veteran musicians with lots of versatility. This band has strong lead and background vocals as well as various instruments that deliver to fill the dance floor! Come dance the night away featuring favorites from the 60s, 70s and 80s.
Registration for this event will begin on Tuesday December 26th. You must register at the Senior Center. Cost is $12.00 for members and $15.00 for non-members.Seating is limited.
My office is always open if you or your family are in need of assistance. Please do not hesitate to contact me by email atJason.Rojas@cga.ct.govor by phone at 860-240-8541.
