No July 4th This Year

Fourth of July celebrations will not be held in Weston this year.

On April 28, the Parks and Recreation Commission voted, reluctantly, to recommend that the Board of Selectmen cancel the event. On May 7, Parks & Recreation director Dave Ungar conveyed the recommendation to the Selectmen, who concluded there was no way to hold the annual celebration safely.

All Memorial Day events now canceled

The Weston Volunteer Fire Department has already called off the Memorial Day parade, and now the PTOs have confirmed what everyone probably already expected: the annual 5K Road Race and Memorial Day Fair are also off the table.

In addition to the community's losing the fun of these popular events, it is injury added to injury for the PTOs, which lose money. Memorial Day events are the largest fundraisers for the organizations. We are told that the PTOs will have to dip into reserves to keep providing services to students, teachers, and the school district.

Parks and Rec summer camps

Last week, the State task force that is formulating plans for gradually reopening Connecticut provided initial, general guidance on how summer camps may be able to be held, beginning on June 29.

Mr. Ungar briefed the Selectmen on the broad strokes of the guidance, and expects to have a more specific set of criteria soon. What he knows so far is that camps will be limited to a maximum of 30 participants and that groups will be limited to 10, including the counselor.

There will also be routine temperature checks and aggressive disinfecting. Mr. Ungar said he needs the additional criteria to determine whether summer camps are feasible this year and, if so, how they could be conducted.