Summer is winding down, but the heat was turned up early this month. I hope you all stayed cool during some of those historically hot days. We had our senior lounge open at Town Hall to make sure our residents could stay safe in the high temps. Hopefully, the hottest days are behind us as we head into my favorite season. But before we welcome fall, we have one of my favorite events: The Terryville Fair. TheTerryville Lions Club will host the 74th Annual Country FairAug. 26-28. We have one of the best smalltown fairs in the area and the Lions Club does a phenomenal job planning this, spending countless hours volunteering their time to make it a success. I encourage all Plymouth residents to attend and support one of the pillar events our community. I’ll be there all weekend working at it and hope to see you there! The ARPA Committee continues to meet monthly to review proposals and hear public comment on the use of the ARPA funds. The public is encouraged to attend and share ideas. Anyone who has a project/business that qualifies is encouraged to attend a meeting and apply to the Committee. Its bittersweet to report that our Public Works Director, Charlie Wiegert, has accepted a new job and will be leaving the Town of Plymouth this month. I would like to thank Charlie for his service to Plymouth and wish him well in the next chapter of his career. The Town Council has approved my nomination of Paul Pronovost, former Public Works Director in Thomaston, to take the reigns as interim director until we find a permanent replacement. We have formed a
search committee to find that replacement. They will make recommendations to the Public Works Board and Council on any changes to the job description they believe is appropriate and will interview candidates. The Town Council will decide who the replacement will be based on the committee’s top selected candidates. The meetings for this Ad-Hoc Committee will be publicly posted and the public is encouraged to attend. One project that has been talked about for many years but has never been funded is upgrading Town Hall to be more compliant with ADA standards. Our Grant
Administrator, Vinnie Klimas, has been hard at work preparing an application for a $500K Small Town Economic Assistance Program (STEAP) grant, which would allow us to renovate our bathrooms at Town Hall to improve accessibility for persons with physical challenges. Hopefully our application will be selected so we can make these
crucial updates. Vinnie is a great asset to our town and works hard to get us funding to help some of our most vulnerable neighbors, like the funding he helped secure for The Plymouth Housing Authority. I’m happy to share we’ve received the first $400K (of a total $5.3 million) allotment to initiate the ADA renovations at Gosinski
Park. As fall quickly approaches and schools open back up, I want to wish all our students a healthy and safe year. And thank you to everyone who makes that possible — from the bus drivers to the cafeteria workers to the janitors
and administration — you all play such a big role in giving our kids a good education. And to the parents who support your kids and the teachers who invest in them each and every day, they’re lucky to have you. As the school year starts and life gets busier, please be sure to add the Plymouth Block Party to your calendars. Back by popular
demand, we will be celebrating our small town on Oct. 1 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. We will have to work around some construction this year due to the realignment of North Main Street, but we will do our best to make sure everyone has a fun day with family and friends.
See you at the fair!
Mayor Joseph Kilduff
