We received some unfortunate news today from the Town of Fairfield. Details of the message are included below and were provided by CVTU member Ryan Knapp. CVTU Board Member and event organizer, John Hildenbrand, contacted Fairfield Police today to confirm the restrictions, and they told him we will not be able to park at Veteran's Park, or have access to the beach and the reef.
Therefore, we will have to cancel this Saturday's event. We hope to reschedule it in September, if restrictions are lifted. These are challenging times and we must flex our activities in accordance with local regulations and restrictions. As your Board, we will keep working to plan exciting and pertinent activities that support CVTU's goals and mission.
Respond to John Hildenbrand with any questions; Jhildenb73@gmail.com or 845-242-7730.
Note from the Town of Fairfield
An Update Regarding Town Beaches:
Hi Fairfielders,
I received numerous emails from residents over the weekend with concerns surrounding our beaches, parking, non-residents and enforcement.
I want to provide a brief update because I am simply unable to respond to the many Facebook posts I'm tagged in.
At the outset of the pandemic I signed an emergency declaration and completely closed all the town public spaces including our beaches. When we reopened, I made the decision after consultation with the Emergency Management Team to limit parking to residents only. We were able to restrict it temporarily because we are in a State of Emergency.
In normal times, because the Town received federal funds for our beaches, we are not allowed to exclude non-residents at Jennings Beach.
Several weeks ago, because we were not reaching capacity at Jennings Beach, and because non-residents were already walking on to our beaches and parking elsewhere, we decided to allow a limited number of parking spots to non-residents. We have adjusted that number a few times while closely monitoring crowding at the beach. Sunday was the first time we had to turn residents away from Jennings Beach - which is unacceptable to me and we immediately increased capacity to allow more residents in.
My first priority is to ensure our residents can safely enjoy our beaches. Our Emergency Management Team's planning committee and I have been monitoring the beaches every week and taking into consideration input from residents. We've taken several steps to address previous concerns:
We added No Beach Parking signage and police enforcement at Bob's parking lot with cooperation from management
We increased patrol and enforcement for parking in the beach area and have given out a record number of tickets over the last several weekend.
The Police Commission voted to increase parking fines from $80 to $200 to help deter illegal parking. I hope the increased fine will cut down on non-permitted parking.
We have added more garbage bins and an extra dumpster and social distancing signage at the beaches.
Given the huge increase in people walking on to our beaches whether via Uber or walking from parking spots miles away, I have asked our Town Attorney to get clarification on what we can legally do. Assuming we can legally and logistically prevent non-residents, it's a challenge because our beaches have countless points of entry.
We are going to research solutions and see if we can come up with a proposal that mitigates the issues we are experiencing at our beaches.
I want residents to know I am frustrated too.
I have asked the Emergency Management Team's planning committee to meet again this week to discuss how we can plan to address the problems we have been seeing in the beach area. I will update residents through my weekly newsletter. Please know I want to ensure our beaches are safe and that our residents are able to enjoy them.