Council Looks Into Creating Larger Building Committee
NEWINGTON - The Town Council is considering whether or not to establish a larger building committee to oversee the entire scope of Newington’s infrastructure needs, including the town hall and library, as well as whether or not to keep the existing bodies intact.

       Nothing’s official, but councilors and committee members alike have expressed a desire to at least keep the separate town hall and library renovations committees intact while also forming a more general overseeing body.

       The proposed â€"super committee” is being discussed at a time in which public officials are looking for a holistic approach to planning future building renovations.

       Several members of the library’s project building committee and board of trustees attended the meeting, and urged the Council to keep their body intact. Their committee formed a year ago with the purpose of overseeing an effort to expand the heavily used and often-congested space.

       Meanwhile, talks of a â€"campus plan” between library and town hall have become a stated goal within both committees.

       â€"Collectively, the current group has the right skills to look at this objectively,” said former Library Board of Trustees president Anna Eddy. â€"You’d be hard-pressed to find a group with similar qualifications.”

       Similar things have been said about the current town hall building committee, maintained by the last Town Council. But Mayor Roy Zartarian, who raised the issue in an email cited by speakers, said that his proposing the â€"super committee” was about establishing a common direction for all future building projects.

       In a phone conversation following the meeting, he said that the fate of the existing committees will have to be determined through further Council deliberation.

       â€"What I did not convey adequately is that it is not our plan to abandon either project,” Zartarian said during the meeting. â€"They both need to be done. The concern has been making sure the projects are coordinated and making sure that what goes in one building is not going to unnecessarily put in the other building.”

       And it’s not just about the library and town hall--two of the biggest projects approaching Newington, he said. Zartarian cited Church Hill Park and Anna Reynolds Elementary School, among other areas, as things the Council will need to look at in coming years.

       â€"We’re looking at an overall committee to shepherd all these projects together,” he said. â€"It’s not to say one is going to come in ahead of any others.”

       Currently, the town hall has been at the forefront of Newington’s objectives. The Council just approved a $27,000 structural integrity study, to be conducted by Hamden-based DTC. If disbanding the existing project committees is a consideration, the Council should at least wait until that report comes back, said Councilor Jim Marocchini, who spoke in support of maintaining both.

       â€"I will never agree with you that we should disband these two committees,” he said. The makeup of these committees is excellent, probably some of the best construction, engineering people that you will ever put on one committee. I don’t see that happening again.”

       Councilor Carol Anest expressed similar thoughts, citing concerns regarding the potential for further delays.

       â€"We’re going to be doing this until 2017 before anything gets going,” Anest said. â€"Like the mayor said, this is going to be the Council that gets the shovel in the ground. So let’s get the shovel in the ground.”
MORE NEWINGTON NEWS  |  STORY BY MARK DIPAOLA  |  Feb 03 2016  |  COMMENTS?