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Daily News Updates @ www.GreenwichSentinel.com

FRIDAY, Aug 30, 2019

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The Briefing Room

Camp Simmons Celebrates

Draft POCD Released

To have input, residents must review & comment before Sept. 19

S Major work on a sewer project will require road closures in the area of Davis Avenue and Bruce Park Avenue, beginning this week and stretching into December. Closures a re e x p e c t e d to t a k e place between 7 a.m., and 5 p.m., on weekdays. Greenwich Police will direct traff ic when necessary; detour signs will be posted. S Megan Wax has been named head field hockey Coach at Greenwich High School, replacing longtime coach, Ally Orric, who resig ned i n Aug ust . Wa x joi ne d t he GHS athletic staff in 2012, and has helped coach girls’ basketball, girls’ lacrosse and field hockey. S Eversource Energy has been recognized with the nation’s highest honor recognizing its support of employees in the military. Eversource was one of 15 companies selected from 2,500 nominations to receive the 2019 Defense Employer Support Freedom Award. S Gov. Ned Lamont held a meeting on Tuesday with over 70 education stakeholders from across t he state to discuss improvements that can be made to i mprove educational outcomes for students, specifically as his administration prepares its package of legislative proposals for the 2020 session of the General Assembly, which begins in February. S The Glenville Volunteer Fire Company is hosting a 9/11 memorial ceremony on Wednesday, Sept. 11 at 7 p.m., at the Glenville Fire House. The event will start with a welcome from the Glenville Volunteer Fire Company, followed by a presentation of the colors, pledge of allegiance, singing of the national anthem, and an invocation.

For Camp Simmons' last day of camp, the celebrity grill masters were Jenny Byxbee and Connie Blunden. Above, campers show their appreciation by performing a wave, coached by Byxbee, in advance of the burgers. For more on this story by Richard Kaufman, see page A10.

After months of hard work a nd pu bl ic out r e ach, a d ra f t o f G r e e nw i c h's 2 01 9 P l a n o f Conservation & Development (POCD) has been released. Completed every 10 years, a POCD is essentially a blueprint for the future. It's a community vision that will guide Greenwich's physical and economic development for the next 10 to 20 years. The POCD will result in a set of new policies directing future growth and development while aiding town leaders in decision making for the community. A POCD addresses land use and development; public social spaces; housing cost and variety; transportation and mobility; parks and open space; public facilities and infrastructure; sustainability a nd resi lienc y, includ ing sea level rise; historic structures and landscapes; changes in retail and work /economic development; and implementation. When changes are made to municipal facilities in town,

t hey go t h roug h a Mu n icipa l Improvement (MI) process. The goal of the process is to determine if the project is in compliance w ith the POCD. A l l zon i ng regulation changes must also be in compliance with the Plan. " Retent ion of c om mu n it y character, which refers to our distinct identity or sense of place, was the issue that we heard most loudly throughout the outreach per iod. This means dif ferent things to different people, but what resonated most with people was promoting tree preservation, tree planting, public sculpture, streetscapes and ensuring that new residential and commercial developments are in scale with and keeping with the existing built environment," said Katie DeLuca, Greenwich's Director of Planning & Zoning. She added that there are action items throughout the Plan desig ned to address those objectives. "For example, in efforts to increase affordable housing stock, we talk about doing so with ‘hidden housing ’ including accessor y

apartments in existing homes and converting existing buildings into residential uses," DeLuca explained. The current draft of the POCD is not final, and changes can be made, which is the purpose of the public workshop scheduled for Sept. 19 at Greenwich High School. The workshop is designed to get feedback from the community. DeLuca said that a public hearing date, when the Commission will take action on the POCD, will be set based on the comments received before and at the Sept. 19 workshop. The Planning & Zoning Department is working toward bringing the POCD up during the December RTM meeting. DeLuca stressed that the Commission has not committed to finalizing anything until they are sure they have community consensus. To v i e w t h e P l a n o f Conservation and Development, go to www.greenwichct.gov. For physical copies, contact Planning and Zoning at 203622-7894.

The Rabbit Effect, A New Look at Your Health By Beth Barhydt The Rabbit Effect, a new book by author Kelli Harding, MD, MPH, opens with some sobering statistics about health in the United States, statistics that might just be remedied by something very basic: kindness. "A m e r i c a n s ," s h e w r i t e s , " a r e remarkably unhealthy. In 2016, the United States ranked forty-third in the world for life expectancy. Unless we change course, the U.S. is expected to drop to sixty-fourth place by 2040." “Life expectancy gives us a snapshot of the Nation’s overall health,” CDC Director Robert R. Redfield said in a statement, “and these sobering statistics are a wakeup call that we are losing too many Americans, too early and too often, to conditions that

are preventable.” Of the leading causes of death in the United States (heart disease, cancer, unintentional injuries, chronic lower respiratory disease, stroke, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, influenza and pneumonia, kidney disease, and suicide) only cancer reportedly registered a decrease in mortality rates. "It's not just life expectancy," suggests Dr. Harding. "America has consistently poor performance on numerous global health measures. For instance, despite spending more than any other country for hospitalbased maternity care, the U.S. is ranked forty-sixth in the world for maternal health." In fact, the United States ranks poorly compared to other developed nations in many key indicators of a nation's health, including infant mortality, car crashes,

mental illness, teen pregnancies, heart disease, imprisonment, homicides, substance abuse, obesity, and premature death. All of this in spite of the fact that the United States spends more on healthcare than any other country in the world, a large portion of which comes from the federal government. In 2017, the United States spent approximately $3.5 trillion, or 17.9 percent of GDP, on health expenditures. That is double the average of most developed countries. It may not be surprising then that biomedical, pharmaceuticals, and healthcare now rank as top economic drivers in the United States, making healthcare the top industry in the nation. So, Dr. Harding poses this question in her introduction, "If biomedical advances and expensive medical care aren't making

Cricket and Jim Lockhart Champion the Bruce Museum

the difference to our health, what is? What would it actually take to make us healthier? Dr. Harding's thesis is this: "When it comes to our health, we've been missing some crucial pieces - hidden factors behind what really makes us healthy. Factors like love, friendship, and dignity." Her book endeavors to prove her thesis using evidence-based studies that offer readers a different way to think about health, one linked to kindness and relationships. She begins with a study on rabbits, which is the genesis of the title, and demonstrates again and again the effect of positive relationships on physical well-being. As The Rabbit Effect reviewer Dr. Robert Nerem wrote, it appears that Ecclesiastes was correct, "a faithf ul f riend is the medicine of life."

Excerpts from The Waterwheel

G.E.M.S. ILLUSTRATED BY WAJIH CHAUDHRY

S Here are some safety tips w it h school back in session. For drivers, yield to pedestrians in crosswalks, and take extra care in school zones. Do not block crosswalks, or pass a vehicle stopped for pedestrians. Never pass a bus loading or unloading children. Those who walk to school should use the sidewalk. If there is no sidewa lk, wa lk facing traffic. Never walk while texting or talking on the phone, and do not walk while using headphones. For students who ride t hei r bi k e to s c ho ol, always wear a helmet and k now the rules of the road. Watch for opening ca r doors a nd ot her hazards, use hand signals when turning, and wear bright-colored clothing.

JOHN FERRIS ROBBEN

By Richard Kaufman

By Jill S. Woolworth, LMFT New Bruce supporters Jim and Cricket Lockhart are championing the Bruce Museum's giant step in expansion. By Anne W. Semmes At t he Br uce Museu m, Cr icket a nd Ji m Lockhart are often cited as one of the Museum’s “first families.” Their love for the Bruce is shared by their Greenwich children and grandchildren. On a recent visit, their oldest grandson, age seven, was fascinated by the Museum’s annual iCreate exhibition of work by high school artists. “He was looking at each painting, analyzing each, picking out his favorite, and wanting to know how old the artist was,” notes Grandfather Jim. Treated to a requested pad and colored pencils from the Museum store, “He was drawing in the car going home.” Museum-going is a Lockhart legacy. Cricket had grandparents living near the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Every trip to see them brought a tour of the Met. When visiting his Westchester-based grandparents, Jim was taken to

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the Bruce. “It’s in the blood,” he notes. “We’ve lived in a lot of different places, and we’ve always gone to museums.” To d ay, Ji m s er ve s a s t he C h a i r of t he Museum’s Board of Trustees, while Cricket serves on the Campaign for the New Bruce Committee and is one of the Co-Chairs of the Campaign launch event, Bruce ConsTRUCKS on Sunday, September 8, a community-wide celebration of the Museum’s transformative renovation and construction project. They are both championing the giant step the Bruce is taking in its expansion. “It’s the aesthetics,” says Cricket. “You’re going to have it looking out toward the Sound – the entrance, with a big sculpture pathway.” “We're going to have much larger permanent art galleries – in fact, four of them,” adds Jim, “and one big giant changing gallery so we’ll be able to do larger-scale exhibitions. We’ll be able to fill

Please turn to page A10

EXPERT LENDERS COMMERCIAL & RESIDENTIAL

G.E.M.S.—Gratitude, Exercise, Meditation and Service—are simple things we can do for ourselves when we’re feeling disconnected or discouraged. G.E.M.S. raise our bodies’ natural levels of dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin and endorphins—our bodies’ feel-good chemicals. Best of all, G.E.M.S. are immediately available and free of cost. It is impossible to be anxious and grateful at the same time. The neurons in your brain fire in either one direction or the other. If you name three things you are grateful for when you sense anxiety creeping in, you will gently shift the blood flow in your brain. Do this before you go to bed and you will sleep better. You don’t have to run a race to get a runner’s high. Exercise in any form works. Dancing, walking, yoga, even climbing a flight of stairs benefits your mind and body. Meditation activates the calming part of your nervous system. It helps you respond to life, rather than react to it. Service—doing something for someone else—activates the parts of our brain that feel connected to others, and purposeful. G.E.M.S. can travel with you wherever you go. Jenna, a col- lege student, referred to gratitude, exercise, meditation and service as “the gems in her pocket” during her study abroad, valuable tools she could use to handle the normal fears and anxieties that come from being in a new place. An excerpt from The Waterwheel by local author, Jill Woolworth, available through Amazon. Alternatively, we encourage you to shop locally where it is also available at Diane's Books or Christ Church Books & Gifts.

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