Milford Musings

Is 2011 the Year of the Dragon? Whoever made this ice sculpture at Greens End Road and Bridgeport Avenue must think so. Thanks to Susan Ashelford, owner of Given to Gauche, for pointing it out to me.

The founder of the Milford Celebrates family New Year’s Eve event said Thursday that he’d like to bring the event back next year, ending a three-year hiatus.

Milford Celebrates featured music acts at several downtown venues, a parade, carnival games and fireworks at midnight. It ran from 2005-2008, but was cancelled after lackluster fundraising and dwindling attendance.

Buisnessman Peter Spalthoff said it would cost about $65,000 to stage the event, although it could be scaled back from previous years. “I am in the process of going after as many businesses as we can get to contribute to this family-oriented party, and for sure it won’t just be the businesses downtown.

“I am making a pitch to them and others that this would be a great way for them to say “thank you” to the Milford community — their customers,” Spalthoff said. “We would tweak it a bit but, for the most part it would be the same format because that seemed to work very well.”

Mayor James L. Richetelli said that he’d be happy to meet with Spalthoff and his committee to see what the city can do. “Many people miss Milford Celebrates since it’s been gone, and we’ve helped out in the past with in-kind services for manpower and buildings.”

Sherman London, who heard the complaint against the Milford police department over missing dashcam video footage, has filed his report, FOI commission spokesman Thomas Hennick said Wednesday.

“The report is being reviewed by staff attorneys and is not releasable at this point,” Hennick said.

The report will become public when it is forwarded to the full commission for action, something that is not likely to happen in time for the January meeting, Hennick said.

Bart Halloran, who represents Frank and Susan Servin, parents of an Orange teen killed in a collision with a Milford police cruiser, said that the missing video was sought to determine whether Milford police have a pattern of driving at high rates of speed on routine business.

David Servin and Ashlie Krakowski, both 19, were killed on June 13, 2009 when a cruiser being driven at a high rate of speed by Officer Jason Anderson slammed into their Mazda on the Boston Post Road.

Anderson was fired by the Police Commission in December and last week declined a plea deal to settle the criminal case against him.

Anderson is awaiting trial on two counts of second degree manslaughter with a motor vehicle.

Chief Keith Mello said that many hours of recorded video that was the subject of Halloran’s FOI request had been inadvertently erased, but that about 20 percent of that material has been forensically recovered.

The Connecticut Post filed an FOI request in October for that recovered material.

Halloran said he and the Krakowski family’s lawyer, John Wynne, will file a lawsuit against the city and the police department “early in the new year.”

A free Parent Leadership Training Institute, preparing volunteers to become community advocates for children, will be offered for the third time here in January.

Applications for ther 18-week program are being accepted by the Milford Health Department, which uses a curriculum developed by the state Commission on Children.

“PTLI provides an opportunity for parents to develop the leadership skills necessary to effect change and to build a strong community,” said Dr. A. Dennis McBride, Milford’s health director. Graduates of the program have gone on to serve on agency boards of directors, initiate programs to serve children in need or earned college credits.

For an application or for more information call coordinator Lesley Darling at 203-783-3314.

Milford residents can have their Christmas trees recycled into garden mulch on Saturday, Jan. 8, by bringing them to either the Walnut Beach parking lot at the bottom of Naugatuck Avenue or the Tri-Beach Center on Hillside Avenue.

Public works crews with wood chippers will be at both sites from 9 a.m. until 1 p.m. You can “reuse” your tree this spring by bringing the material home, or leaving it for the city to put in flower beds and plantings. How “green” is that?

And if you’d rather just drag that spruce or pine out to the curb, it will be picked up as part of the regular trash collections during January, as long as the trees are cut into lengths of no more than four feet.

Local teen rockers Kicking Daisies are set to perform twice over the weekend as part of the Orange Bowl festivities.

They’ll play a benefit on New Year’s Day, from 2 to 4 p.m., at Miami Children’s Hospital. This event is for the hospital’s patients and families.

Kicking Daisies is also performing at Orange Drive’s ‘Noon Year’s Eve Kids Countdown’, which is taking place from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Friday, alongside Ocean Drive in South Beach.

The band fronted by Milford sisters Caitlin and Carly Kalafus won the third season of Radio Disney’s Next Big Thing, and has a CD ready for release.