Thursday, October 31, 2019
www.berlincitizen.com
Volume 22, Number 36
LIBRARY PROGRAM
BUSINESS FORUM
Outside-the-box thinking touted By Devin Leith-Yessian The Citizen
Showcasing recent business success stories in town and projects in the pipeline, Mayor Mark Kaczynski and the Economic Development Commission held an economic development forum on Oct. 24.
Though this tearful conversation was part of a play — “Suddenly” by Ellen Davis Sullivan — to introduce the
Hosted by the Berlin Rotary Club and the library, the forum featured Luis Pantoja, a health educator at the Central Connecticut Health District, who spoke about how opioid addiction manifests in users and how the epidemic rose to claim over 1,000 lives in 2018 in Connecticut alone.
Pantoja was joined by Jessica Collins, the regional director of behavioral health at the Hospital of Central Connecticut, who runs the HOPE Initiative — Heroin/ Opioid Prevention & Education — for Hartford Healthcare. Pantoja outlined how out the ongoing opioid crisis has its roots in the over-prescribing of painkillers in the 1990s, when manufacturers pushed for pain to be conSee Opioid, A6
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PAID FOR BY THE BERLIN DEMOCRATIC TOWN COMMITTEE, RICHARD PRICE, TREASURER
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Arguing about whether to write in their daughter’s obituary that she had died of an opioid overdose, two parents weighed if how they wished to remember their daughter should take precedence over warning other families of the dangers that drugs can hold.
issue of opioid addiction before a forum on the topic at Berlin-Peck Memorial Library, attendees at the Oct. 23 talk said the fictional discussion struck a cord.
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Confronting the opioid crisis
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Photos by Devin Leith-Yessian, The Citizen
TOWN COUNCIL
While there are still vacancies along Farmington Avenue, Kaczynski said the downtown Berlin is fostering is doing relative“There’s a lot of exciting ly well in a difficult comthings happening and I mercial environment that want to highlight, obviis moving towards online ously, some of the manu- purchases. He noted that facturers that have come Newport Realty, which to town and some of the was represented by Newexpansions,” said Kaczyns- ington developer Tony ki, who requested that the Valenti at the forum, is forum be held to show up- working with the town to coming projects and the build five mixed use changes that have helped buildings — containing to make them possible. 8,400 square feet of retail The forum was held in the space, 10,800 feet of office or medical space and 76 Town Hall’s foyer last Thursday and featured market rate apartments — adjacent to the train staa presentation from the mayor and and local busi- tion, based on their confiness owners who have in- dence in the local economy. vested in Berlin or have large upcoming projects, Kaczynski said when he including Budney first came into office he Aerospace — which recently announced a new See Business, A12
Helen Malinka and Ken Aveline perform “Suddenly,” a play by Ellen Davis Sullivan, to open a forum on opioid addiction at Berlin-Peck Memorial Library on Oct. 23.
By Devin Leith-Yessian The Citizen
60,000 square foot expansion at 2061 Berlin Turnpike — and Forrest Machine, another aerospace manufacturer, which relocated to Berlin from Rocky Hill last year.
JOHN O’BRIEN
RYAN ZELEK