cheshirecitizen.com
Volume 12, Number 49
Thursday, December 9, 2021
Town posts requirements for winter snow concerns
PROTECTING POLLINATORS
As winter approaches, the Cheshire Public Works Department asks residents for their cooperation in keeping town roads safe by following these regulations and suggestions. •Street obstructions: Parking ban announcements will be made through local media and on the town website, CheshireCT.org. During a ban, town ordinance prohibits parking on the street. Any vehicle so parked may be towed. Basketball hoops and other private property should be removed from the rights-ofway. n Sidewalks:
The Cheshire Pollinator Pathway asks the public to leave their gardens intact for the winter. The group, a partner with the Coalition for a Sustainable Cheshire, recently placed a sign in its North Brooksvale Road garden to remind the public about fireflies, Eastern commas, Viceroy butterflies, cecropia moths, bumblebees and other pollinators that overwinter in gardens; tucked into leaves, plant stems, crevices in shrubs and trees, and the soil. By leaving leaves and not cutting back stems until spring, pollinators can complete their life cycle uninterrupted, providing an increase in local biodiversity. Pictured: Cheshire Pollinator Pathway volunteer Karena Kulakowski at the Pollinator Pathway garden.
Per town ordinance, property owners are responsible to clear snow and ice from adjacent sidewalks within 24 hours of the end of the snowfall or precipitation event. Residents are encouraged to wait until the town plows have pushed snow back to the curb line before clearing the sidewalks and driveway aprons.
Submitted photo
See Winter, A2
Prison on partial lockdown to stop spread of COVID-19 By Kelan Lyons The Connecticut Mirror
Boys and young men at Manson Youth Institution in Cheshire have been mostly confined to their cells since Nov. 19 due to an outbreak of COVID-19, the state child advocate said last week. To mitigate the spread of the virus, youths are spending most of their time locked in their cells, raising the advocate’s concern about access to mental health resources, group rehabilitative programming and school instruction. “I understand the need for safety
protocols, but I remain concerned about reliance on so much isolation, cell confinement,” said Sarah Eagan, the state’s Child Advocate. “There’s no rehabilitative groups. There’s no in-person school.” There were 305 males being held at Manson as of Dec. 1, 263 of whom are between the ages of 18 and 21; 42 were younger than age 18. Eagan said she was especially concerned about the low vaccination rate at the youth prison. She said just six of the 42 minors currently there have been vaccinated against COVID-19, or about 14%, along with roughly 90 young adults, or about
34% of those age 18 to 21. Just over 5,000 prisoners across the correction system have been vaccinated against COVID-19. “The vaccine hesitancy at MYI is no different than the hesitancy we see in the community. There are people who don’t trust the vaccine, believing it wasn’t properly vetted, and others having confidence that they will be fine even if they contract the virus,” Karen Martucci, the Department of Correction’s Director of External Affairs, said in a statement. “We have placed a strong focus on education. Our latest efforts include utilizing trained incarcerated people
that are certified nursing assistants (CNA) to speak with the population. The peer to peer connection has proved to be powerful in similar initiatives.” Martucci said one difference between the incarcerated population and those in the community is that prisoners are tested every other week. “You won’t see that in the community or any school system,” Martucci said. “This testing regiment reduces spread by quickly identifying cases. We know that asymptomatic people See Youth prison, A10