At the Thursday Board of Selectmen meeting, First Selectman Fred Camillo said there were upcoming bills in Hartford that would erode local control, including housing bills that would require, for example, allowing 5 ft setbacks and no restrictions on height, which he said would be horrible.
He said one bill he supports would strengthen the “vexatious requester” law as it pertains to FOI requests.
Connecticut Senate Bill 466 (SB 466), introduced in 2026, aims to curb “vexatious requesters” of public records by allowing state agencies to ignore harassing or threatening Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for up to three years.
“That is in response to all of these freedom of information requests we’re getting. The spirit of the law has been violated a lot,” Camillo said. “We’ve estimated certain individuals have cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars alone because we have to send department heads up to Hartford and it’s an all day thing.”
Camillo said last Friday one individual did not appear for a second time in a row.
“That was a whole day for us. It’s not fair. We want this law to be strengthened so you would be able to ignore somebody after they have been deemed a vexatious requester.”
Camillo said people who FOI his email list to send out political messages are violating the spirit of the law, but are not “vexatious requesters.”
“Somebody who is a vexatious requester is submitting FOI requests to harass and does it constantly, and we have several. You can count them on one hand, most people know who they are.”
Camillo said the Greenwich delegation offered to support the bill and he had reached out to other legislators for their support.
File photo of outdoor dining node on Greenwich Avenue in 2022. Photo: Leslie Yager
Outdoor Dining
The Selectmen voted unanimously to approve outdoor dining fees and shorten the end of the outdoor dining season so that it is “suggested” to end on Sunday, October 4 rather than October 18, which was the other option.
The season starts on May 22.
DPW commissioner Jim Michel had said the later end date would overlap with the DPW crew’s leaf collection effort and asked for the October 4 end date.
In 2025 the town collected a total of $110,640 in fees from 17 restaurants. Fees included $33,840 in barrier cost and $76,800 in parking stalls revenue.
The 2026 season will be the sixth year of outdoor dining inside “nodes” which are the jersey barriers that enclose metered parking spaces.
The selectmen took 3 meetings to mull over the decision because this year the fees were proposed to include extra funds for green jersey barrier covers selected by DPW.
Town administrator Kate Buch said “Overall, adding the covers to the barriers is going to be a big plus.”
Camillo said he’d heard from one restaurant owner who was disappointed about a shortened outdoor dining season, but was not aware that outdoor dining was already allowed on the sidewalk.
DPW commissioner, Mr. Michel clarified that outdoor dining on sidewalks still needs to go through P&Z for approval.
Mr. Michel said an e-mail had been sent to all restaurants that participated in outdoor dining in parking spots inside jersey barriers and only had one response.
“We basically said if we don’t hear from, you we’re assuming that it’s okay,” Mr. Michel said.
“Did someone follow up with a phone call? I don’t want to get a call from someone saying I didn’t know about it,” Camillo said.
Mr. Michel said with the new calculations, the increase for the covers on top of the barriers was only a few hundred dollars.
Selectwoman Rachel Khanna asked if fewer restaurants were applying to participate in outdoor dining in the street than in the past.
“It’s actually decreased over the years,” Mr. Michel said, adding that some restaurants have turned over and, for example, the space that was formerly Ruby & Bella inside SaksWorks was not going to be a restaurant.
As for the end date for outdoor dining in the street, Camillo said, “I know Jim (Michel) preferred the 4th. We did hear from some people preferring the 18th because October is a really nice month and we’ve already shortened the season. I’ll leave it up to my colleagues.”
“I’m in favor of the earlier – the 4th – to honor (Mr. Michel’s) request,” selectwoman Rachel Khanna said.
Selectwoman Lauren Rabin Rabin said, “I’m in favor of the later (date), but, I don’t mind if it’s the 4th.”
“I will agree with Rachel to go with the 4th. Not that I’m happy with it. I can see 80° days on (October) 10th. We’ll see. We’ll monitor it,” Camillo said.
The Selectmen voted 3-0 on a motion to approve the 2026 outdoor dining fees and a “suggested” end date of Oct 4.
New Cohen Eastern Greenwich Civic Center in Old Greenwich. April 9, 2025 Photo: Leslie Yager
OGRCC Lease
Joe Siciliano proposed the Municipal Improvement status referral to the Planning & Zoning commission for the lease of office space to the Old Greenwich-Riverside Community Center (OGRCC) in the new Cohen Eastern Greenwich Civic Center.
The OGRCC has been serving the Greenwich community for more than 80 years and for about 25 years had office space upstairs in the old civic center building.
Siciliano said, “When we designed the building we did the design with having them as a partner in mind to have office space and to be able to rent internal space in the building to provide service to the public for some of their programs.”
“Their offices are at the rear of the building. They have 24-hour access to their office space which is approximately 11,035 square feet.”
Siciliano said Thursday marked the one year anniversary of the opening of the Cohen Greenwich Civic Center.
“The building is very successful and we have a lot of people wanting to use the building through the OGRCC and also through the general public,” he said.
Siciliano said the OGRCC have already been in the building for one year and under a “rental agreement” and the goal was to create a longer-term lease.
He noted OGRCC runs a variety of programming including sports as well as enrichment classes like cooking.
The initial lease is for five years and there is a renewal term of another five years.
The base rent is $4,800 for the first and second years, followed by a 7-1/2% increase starting on year three, and will be increased annually thereafter.
The proposed lease was a first read.
See also:
Civic Fanfare on Display for Cohen Eastern Greenwich Civic Center Ribbon Cutting
April 9, 2025