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After a massive storm left many without power for nearly a week last March, the town pressed the state to put a generator at the Bendheim Western Greenwich Civic Center, one of its two emergency shelters. On Monday morning, First Selectman Peter Tesei officially announced the installation of the generator.
The Western Greenwich Civic Center can accommodate 225 people as a shelter and up to 350 people if it's being used as a cooling or warming center. When storms ripped through Greenwich in March, many residents stayed overnight there for nearly a week.[breakhere]
"When the next bad thing hits ... we can get better in our ability to withstand and then recover to make this a great place to live and to work," said Peter J. Boynton, the state's commissioner for emergency management and homeland security department. The other emergency shelter is at Eastern Middle School.
Dan Warzoha, the town's director of emergency management, also announced Greenwich will receive an emergency shelter trailer later this week, paid for with funding from the state.
"It will augment the trailers the chapter already has and will be another means of placing resources out there in the community in central locations," said Tim Wall, director of emergency services for the Greenwich chapter of the American Red Cross. He was part of the team lobbying for the emergency trailer for the town and said the locations for the trailers will be determined soon.
The installation of the emergency generator is the result of collaboration among the Connecticut Department of Emergency Management and Homeland Security, the Town of Greenwich and Partners in Emergency Preparedness.
Officials from the Representative Town Meeting, the Greenwich Police Department, the Greenwich Fire Department and Greenwich Emergency Medical Service attended along with state Sen. L Scott Frantz and state Reps. Livvy Floren and Lile Gibbons.
Have you used the Greenwich facilities as shelters in an emergency? What is it like?
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