Chamber Has A Visionary Guide For Its Sandy Hook Tour

By Kaaren Valenta

Members of the Newtown Chamber of Commerce went on a walking tour of Sandy Hook Center last Thursday morning led by Michael Porco of Porco Construction, a developer who has played a major role in its restoration.

The tour started with coffee and breakfast pastries at Mocha, the coffeehouse at  3 Glen Road, and wound its way through five of the buildings, winding up on the banks of the Pootatuck River where a farmers market is held every Sunday.

“We got involved in early 1998 when we bought three buildings [on Church Hill Road],” Mr Porco said. “It was a tough, tough decision because of the expense. They were really in disarray. Then just by chance this building [that houses Mocha] became available.”

Eventually Mr Porco would own the strip of shops where a hair salon and a Subway shop are located, the building that houses the Toy Corner, the building that has his family’s karate school as well as the brick building, which now houses the Red Brick Tavern, and a Victorian house at 5 Glen Road, site of Tre Ragazze. A new building, slated to be 4,500 square feet, also is planned along the river.

Mr Porco spoke about the history of the buildings, some of which started as blacksmith shops, a stable, a hotel, and Crowe’s Drug Store complete with a soda fountain.  Generally the structures were solid, but a great deal of restoration had to be done.

“I was fortunate to have my son with me to help with the construction,” Mr Porco said. “One of the biggest issues about the village is the lack of parking. I attacked the parking problem by putting in a retaining wall on the edge of the river and putting in 25 spaces [behind the buildings on Church Hill Road]. That in itself contributed to a lot of business coming here.”

He didn’t want just any business either.

“I wanted businesses that would bring families down here,” he said. “Businesses like the karate school, Mr Turtle [preschool], and Michael Palumbo’s toy store.”

The toy store at one time had been the Golden Peach Hotel. Next door, the Sandy Hook Hotel was the site of the infamous shootout involving members of a motorcycle gang in the 1970s. The red building on Washington Avenue that for years was the Sandy Hook Post Office, and is now the Little Green Barn, earlier was the First National grocery store.

Mocha, which is also operated by Michael Palumbo, is in a little building that has been many things over the years including a coin-operated laundry and a gift shop. Years ago it was a blacksmith shop.

“There’s a bellows wheel still in place on the second floor and we found a sign that had the name of the blacksmith on it,” Mr Porco said.

The brick building was built in 1831 as a general store, he said, with an addition about 20 years later. “Mr Warner, the original proprietor, owned the lots where Mocha and Tre Ragazze are located and also owned property on the other side of Church Hill, where the small park is now. There was a building on the site but it burned down.”

There were many wooden buildings and outbuildings in the village of Newtown, and many of them were lost to fire, he said, including an opera house near the Dayton Street bridge.

Now that the restaurant has opened in the brick building, there is dining on the deck overlooking the river and private parties are being held on the second floor.

Mr Porco built an 800-foot-long wall along the river, constructed a large parking lot, and installed what he described as a “gazebo without a roof” for outdoor events.

“There is going to be a fashion show on August 28 in conjunction with the farmers market that runs every Sunday,” Mr Porco said. “The town changed the zoning two years ago to accommodate these kind of events. We are trying to make this area a destination point, a place where people can come to congregate. We’re trying to bring it back to what it was like in the early 30s, when this was a shopping destination.”

He complimented other business owners like Vito Kala of The Villa restaurant, Michael Burton who owns properties across Church Hill Road, and Joe Tartagalio who is planning to open a restaurant on the corner of Church Hill Road and Dayton Street.

The town has plans for a $1.25 million streetscape in Sandy Hook Center, scheduled to begin this summer with a $470,000 state grant to upgrade the sidewalks, parking, and install new light posts.

Chamber member Don Sharpe commented that Mr Porco had obviously made his own huge investment in infrastructure.

“It is like when you are swimming across the river and get caught in the middle — what bank do you swim to?” Mr Porco said. He said the final phase of his projects would include a pedestrian bridge across the river connecting the two sets of properties.

“We want to try to make it a covered bridge, something that would be a point of interest,” he said.

Patty Graves described Mr Porco’s efforts as similar to those of  the children’s storybook The Little Engine That Could. “It’s taken a long time, but he did it,” she said.

“He had the vision,” Chamber President Pat Linnell agreed.