Will Community Center Be A Crowded House?

By Kendra Bobowick

The problem boils down to space and configuration.

Commission on Aging member John Aurelia insisted, “The second floor is not doable. It’s out.”

However, tentative plans to combine facilities for seniors, the Parks and Recreation Department, and possibly the newly established Newtown Cultural Arts Commission are too abstract to say for certain where or how a building may be located on the Fairfield Hills campus. Parks and Recreation Department Chairman Barbara Kasbarian said, “There are still a lot of unknowns.”

A second floor? She believes that confusion arose from an unofficial drawing of what a combined use building could look like if adjoined to private resident Peter D’Amico’s proposed sports complex. The plans sketched out senior space above recreation space, which Ms Kasbarian, Mr Aurelia, and Senior Center Director Marilyn Place agree is not possible.

Ms Kasbarian stressed, “That’s not the plan. We’ll have our architect draw designs.” Rather than seeing the seniors pursue a new building and the recreation department and possibly the arts commission do the same, officials are considering a combined-use facility. The seniors need more space to accommodate a growing number of residents and activities, and similarly, the recreation department needs to expand. The recently formed arts commission’s intention to promote the arts includes a place to both showcase and create work. The first selectman suggested the groups consider a combined-use building.

Earlier this summer during a Parks and Recreation Commission meeting, Mr Aurelia shared his doubts about “that magic word, multipurpose…” He worries that seniors won’t have any dedicated space of their own.

Ms Kasbarian assured him, “We’re not taking any space.” Chairman Ed Marks added, “We would never consider you giving up space…” He told Mr Aurelia, “We have requested what you have requested from us,” as Parks and Rec conveys to designers space needs for the community center. Official plans have not yet been drawn.

Putting his space needs into numbers, Mr Aurelia explained, “We have 4,800 seniors in town, 2,200 get the monthly [senior center] flyers, but we can only serve so many in the current facility and we’re sharing it with ourselves.” He makes the point that the seniors alone must divide their activity times because of too little space. Providing one example, he said, “Girls with their sewing have to pack up and make room for line dancing.”

Hoping to describe a likely future scenario, Mr Marks said, “In simple terms right now, Parks and Rec would be on one floor and the seniors on another floor with some shared space with the understanding that it has to be worked out, with the understanding that you’re not going to have to pack up and make way for someone else.”

Although he stressed that seniors want their own space, he said if circumstances were right, and seniors were not on a second floor, for one, he would “probably” consider combined space, “very much.”

Ms Place acknowledged that seniors would prefer their own space, but said, “Sharing is tough. It’s how it is planned out and how it’s organized.”

The Senior Center is currently located at 14 Riverside Road in Newtown’s multipurpose building that houses the seniors and the Children’s Adventure Center. A roughly 850-square-foot addition will soon be constructed for the seniors and will include additional handicap accessible bathroom space and a second floor for storage.