Person-to-Person
Many families in our area are struggling with the economic repercussions of temporary unemployment. Person-to-Person (P2P) serves residents of Fairfield County who are affected by the outbreak. No proof of income is required for those who are seeking food assistance.
Free shelf-stable groceries including produce, protein and dairy are available to employees furloughed due to COVID-19 and residents with incomes below 235 percent of federal poverty guidelines. Call 203-655-0048 to make an appointment. Locations in Darien, Norwalk and Stamford supply food to the public with varying hours.
P2P is also supplying emergency financial assistance for those who need help with rent, security deposits, utilities and small emergency expenses. Call 203-655-0048 for more information.
If you’re not struggling to put food on the table, consider helping others by donating food, toiletries, paper goods, diapers or gift cards. These supplies can be dropped off at 1864 Post Road in Darien or 76 South Main Street in Norwalk from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon, and after hours by appointment. For more details, call 203-621-0703.
Finally, you can donate to a virtual food drive at www.p2phelps.org. Person-to-Person can purchase more than $3 worth of food with every dollar donated.
Unemployment and Layoffs
Unfortunately, an increasing number of businesses will be laying off staff and reducing hours. The financial repercussions of this health crisis could be tremendous. The Connecticut Department of Labor asks that you follow these steps if you are a worker or business owner who needs to file for unemployment:
If you are a worker: Visit www.filectui.com to file for unemployment as soon as possible. It is important to file as soon as you become unemployed. If you need help completing your application, email dol.webhelp@ct.gov.
If you contract COVID-19 and need to take time off work or are fired, you may file for unemployment benefits. You may also file for unemployment benefits if you are required to self-quarantine, your employer closes during this outbreak or a family member becomes ill. The outcome will depend on a case-by-case basis.
If your employer only permits you to work part-time instead of full-time or you work multiple jobs and your full-time employer closes, you may be eligible for partial unemployment.
If your employer retaliates against you for filing unemployment, you may file a complaint under the Connecticut Unemployment Compensation Act.
The Department of Labor is also suspending federal work search programs requiring unemployment recipients to meet one-on-one for assistance and is suspending work search requirements for unemployment benefits. Furloughed employees are eligible for at least six weeks of benefits.
If you are an employer: If one of your employees is sick with COVID-19, you can require them to stay home, though you should issue them an Unemployment Separation Package.
If you must close your business due to illness or quarantine, direct your employees to www.filectui.com.
The Department of Labor offers a SharedWork program for employers seeing business slow down. This is an alternative to a layoff, allowing employers to reduce full-time employees’ wages by up to 60 percent while workers collect partial unemployment. All employers with at least two full-time or permanent part-time employees can participate. A reduction of work must be between 10 and 60 percent of activities.
More details, including information about paid sick leave, wages and hours, and family medical leave, can be found at this link.
Small Businesses
Small businesses are the cornerstone of Connecticut’s economy, employing roughly 700,00 residents. That’s why Connecticut’s Department of Economic and Community Development announced that the 800 small business owners who owe loan payments to the state’s Small Business Express program can defer payment for three months.
Yesterday Governor Lamont submitted a request to the U.S. Small Business Administration, asking the federal agency to issue a declaration that will enable Connecticut’s small business owners to receive economic injury disaster loans. Once these loans become available, I will spread the word on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Starting Thursday, Stop & Shop will offer seniors-only shopping from 6 a.m. to 7:30. Only customers 60 and over — the most vulnerable group for acquiring the virus — will be allowed in the store then.
The decision was made, the chain says, to “practice effective social distancing.”
In addition, starting today, all Stop & Shop stores will now close at 8 p.m. That will give employees more time to unload inventory and stock shelves.
(Hat tip: Paula Lacy)
Nathaniel Brogadir of Delivery.com is offering local restaurant owners no fees for 30 days. Owners should email nbrogadir@delivery.com for details.
Westport’s Parks & Recreation Department has closed its office until further notice.
All programs and program registration is postponed indefinitely.
Beach emblem sales are postponed until April 1. They can be ordered online then. If assistance is needed, call 203-341-5090.
Westport’s Parks & Rec Department in Longshore is closed until further notice. (Photo/Lynn U. Miller)
For people battling alcoholism and other addictions, 12-step programs are a lifeline.
The human connection of meeting, sharing with and finding support in other people is crucial to the day-by-day process of recovery.
Saugatuck Congregational Church and St. Luke’s Stables has not yet closed its doors to 12-step meetings. All groups are taking precautions, of course. [UPDATE: After this story was posted, word was received that St. Luke’s Stables has closed its meetings.]
If they do, getting together outdoors — keeping distance, of course — is Plan B. But even that is strongly discouraged.
Plan C is virtual meetings. Zoom licenses are available. Skype is another option. Group members should email aawestportct@gmail.co for help with technical issues.
The go-to source for meeting updates is a special Westport AA page on Facebook. Click here for information, including important phone numbers and resources.
[UPDATE] High Watch — the noted AA-based recovery center in Kent — is running 2 online meetings a day (noon and 7:30 pm). Click here for details.
For Al-Anon and Alateen groups, click here. For Narcotics Anonymous, click here.
Self-isolating can be difficult for anyone. For those with addiction issues, the peril is exponentially higher. AA members are doing all they can to provide support in these difficult times.
1st Selectman Jim Marpe has announced that under the powers granted by Connecticut General Statute 28-8a and Westport’s Emergency Preparedness Ordinance, Chapter 26, Article III, he has declared a Local Civil Preparedness Emergency.
The statute and ordinance allow for this declaration in the event of a local emergency creating a risk of severe hazards to life, welfare or property of the town of Westport or its residents, and includes any public health crisis occurring in or adversely affecting the town. The 1st Selectman says:
As of 8 p.m. today (Monday, March 16) the following will remain in effect until further notice:
All restaurants, including bars, delicatessens and other locations where food and/or beverages are prepared for on-premises consumption, are prohibited from all in-restaurant and outside service. No customers are allowed inside a restaurant. Delivery of food and beverages and curb-side pick-up of food and beverages is permitted, subject to all existing laws. This prohibition does not apply to cafeterias where employers provide meals exclusively for employees and residents/patients.
All commercial gyms and fitness centers shall be closed.
All nail and hair salons and barber shops shall serve by appointment only.
There shall be no social or other gatherings of any sort at the Inn at Longshore.
The onset of the COVID-19 virus has introduced a public health crisis to Westport. Westport Weston Public Health Department director Mark Cooper says that of the 31 Westport residents recently tested for the presence of the COVID-19 virus, 20 tested positive. This confirms that the virus has developed a significant presence in our community, and highlights the need to take a much more aggressive action to limit the spread of the virus through social contact.
First Selectman Jim Marpe (left) and Westport Weston Health District director Mark Cooper.
There have been repeated calls by the town and Health District for residents to socially isolate or distance themselves in order to “flatten the curve” of the virus spread. Nevertheless, many instances and opportunities to gather in groups and to further spread the virus remain.
Marpe adds, “I want to thank our residents, the public and private schools and all the local organizations, houses of worship, businesses and other groups that have worked to fulfill the previous request to not gather in groups. Unfortunately, based on the advice of Health director Mark Cooper and other public health experts, I concluded that the town must take additional steps under the LCPE to reduce any group gatherings and minimize social contact.
“We support and encourage local restaurant curb-side pick-up and direct delivery of food at this time. We recognize the financial and operational hardships that this introduces to the businesses and employees as well as the inconvenience to their customers. This decision has not been taken lightly, but is nevertheless demanded because of the risks of the current COVID-19 public health crisis. We encourage all residents to patronize any businesses that remain open under required conditions. Westport is committed to promoting the patronage of these businesses as much as possible.”
As Westporters hunker down at home, there’s one group of neighbors we can’t forget: the homeless.
Homes with Hope serves Westport’s most vulnerable population. For 36 years, individual citizens, civic organizations, religious institutions and schools have dropped off food — and volunteered to serve it — at Gillespie Center, the downtown shelter.
During the COVID-19 crisis, Homes with Hope will continue to do their great work. But a few things have changed.
People can continue to bring food for lunch and dinner. Just call ahead, or knock on the door. A staff member will pick up the items from you in the courtyard (behind Restoration Hardware).
However, volunteers no longer serve meals. Those will be handled by staff.
Christine Baskin hands donated items to Homes with Hope staff member Pat Wilson.
In addition, the community kitchen will no longer serve meals for non-resident guests inside. Instead, prepared food bags will be available for pick-up in the courtyard. Each bag includes a flyer with instructions for hand washing and other best practices.
Residents can still drop off items for the food pantry, which is available to anyone who’s hungry. Non-perishable goods like soups, tuna fish, and canned items are needed. These groceries will be brought curbside to anyone in need of food.
In other words: All operations continue at Gillespie Center. Everyone will be served; no one is turned away. However, some procedures are changed, to protect residents and staff members.
Need is as high — in fact, much higher — than ever. Homes with Hope thanks everyone who has helped in the past, and all those who continue to.
(Need help with housing or food? Want to help? Call Homes with Hope director Helen McAlinden directly: 475-225-5292.)
Much has been written about the spread of COVID-19, and the importance of social distancing, self-isolation and quarantine.
But it’s one thing to read about protective measures. It’s another thing entirely to watch them unfold.
Thanks to Washington Post graphics report Harry Stevens, we can.
And — because the 2004 Staples High School graduate’s piece on the virus has been shared relentlessly by readers — so can the rest of the world.
The “corona simulator” (click here to see) provides vivid evidence of how a disease spreads through a population. Moving dots represent healthy, sick and recovered people.
The dots move randomly, interacting with other dots. Importantly, each viewing of Stevens’ simulation is different. My random sample is different from yours. In fact, each time you scroll up and look at the graphic again, it’s different.
A static screenshot of Harry Stevens’ moving simulation.
That illustrates the randomness of our encounters with each other. But the key finding is usually the same: Extensive distancing is the best way to slow the spread of disease.
(There is one unrealistic element to his moving graphs, the story notes: Dots don’t “disappear” when someone “dies.”)
Harry Stevens (Photo/ Sarah L. Voisin for The Washington Post)
Stevens’ route to the Washington Post began in another down time: the recession of 2008. After acting in Staples Players and college, he graduated at a time of few enticing professional opportunities.
“I kind of fell into journalism by mistake. But I liked it,” he says.
So he headed to Columbia Journalism School, to learn enough to be hired by an actual newsroom.
At Columbia, he saw how journalists can enrich their reporting through data analysis and visualization. He was hooked.
A year after graduating he followed his girlfriend (now wife) Indrani Basu back to her home town: New Delhi. She’s a fellow journalist, and had just gotten a great job helping launch HuffPost India, as news editor.
Stevens landed a newspaper job in Delhi. They let him experiment with “all kinds of weird ideas” about how to do data journalism on the internet.
He started at the Washington Post 6 months ago.
“It’s really cool,” he says. “There are so many smart and talented people here, so there are lots of chances to learn new things and get better at the craft.”
The idea for the COVID-19 story began as he read how diseases spread exponentially. “I had a hard time internalizing what that means,” he says.
A year earlier he’d been experimenting with making circles bounce off each other. He realized now that he could apply that to show how network effects work.
When he got the basic simulation working (with help from data pioneers Bret Victor and Adam Pearce), he realized the story could be “very cool.”
It is.
As well as amazingly educational, and incredibly important.
Part of Harry Stevens’ story shows 4 different outcomes in disease prevention.
The timing may not be the greatest. But today there’s good news downtown.
After months of work, Lululemon has moved into the Main Street property previously occupied by Nike. With 5,500 square feet, the popular athletic wear store has almost doubled their previous space.
The opening comes after months of work that brought a desolate look — plywood-covered windows in front, and construction blocking Parker Harding Plaza in back — to the area.
The work was necessary to flood-proof the vulnerable property. Basements have been redesigned, and walls bathtubbed to prevent water from spreading.
Lululemon Athletica is open for business.
The landlord — Empire State Realty Trust — owns other Main Street property too, all the way down to the former Westport Pizzeria.
Skip Lane — Empire State’s broker — says that other stores will open soon, once their own flood-proofing and renovations are complete.
7 for All Mankind — a men’s and women’s jeans store — will share space in the old Chico’s with Splendid, which offers casual clothes for women and children.
On the north side of Lululemon, Johnny Was — the boho-chic clothier — opens soon.
A deal is close for the old Lululemon space. And Theory — another women’s clothing store — is being renovated too.
Sundance — founded by Robert Redford in 1969 as a general store, and now a retailer of men’s and women’s apparel, jewelry, footwear, accessories and home furnishings — will take over the former Ann Taylor space.
On the other side of Main Street, Lane says, a “cool high-end furniture line” will move into Banana Republic.
With most Americans worried about COVID-19 — and heeding advice to avoid crowds, if not self-isolate — this might not seem the best time to announce new store openings in Westport.
But the plywood has been up too long on Main Street. It’s coming down now. Soon enough, Empire State Realty Trust — and everyone else invested in downtown — hopes, the shoppers will return.
Tampa Bay Times reporter Leonora LaPeter Anton wrote a heart-wrenching story about the coronavirus’ effect on her life. She had just moved her 93-year-old father into a memory care unit, and now she cannot even visit him.
Her father is Bob Bohen. He raised her as a single parent in Westport, in the late 1970s and ’80s. He worked 2 jobs, but was always there when she got home after school. She graduated from Staples High in 1982.
“He let me have huge sleepovers and was beloved among my friends,” Leonora writes. “He took me out to eat. Every night.”
In 2016, Leonora shared a Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting. She was part of a Tampa Bay Times/Sarasota Herald-Tribune team honored for their series on violence and neglect in Florida mental hospitals.
Leonora LaPeter Anton receives congratulations from colleagues.
Here is her — and her father’s — story:
Raising me alone in the late 1970s and early 1980s in Westport, Conn., he worked two part-time jobs — one as an insurance inspector and another inspecting high-rise elevators in Manhattan — so he could often be there when I got home from school. When I got my period for the first time, I went to him.
He’d bump into walls and trip and fall to make me laugh. He let me have huge sleepovers and was beloved among my friends. He took me out to eat. Every night.
Outside Dad’s assisted living facility, I parked and ran. I’d heard that they were about to shut The Fountains at Boca Ciega Bay to all visitors, including family. I had moved my 93-year-old father, who has Parkinson’s disease, onto the memory care floor just the week before.
When I got to him, he was sitting in his recliner, the TV screen dominated by the microscopic images of the coronavirus.
But he was in his own mind. He glanced up at me, and his face broke into a smile. I stood back.
How to tell him that I wasn’t sure when I’d be able to see him again. Would he understand?
I try to visit him every day, because, quite frankly, I’m not sure if there will be a tomorrow, and also because he loves, more than anything, to go out for an evening meal. Often, after an hour or two together, his mood improves and I find glints of the wise-cracking man who raised me. He comes back.
I pointed to the TV, mentioned the virus. I told him I wouldn’t be able to visit for some time after today.
“How long?” he asked, his hazel eyes wide.
I wasn’t sure.
“They’re worried I’ll give it to you,” I told him. “So that’s why I can’t come.”
He pondered that for a few seconds. Then he said: “Should I leave this place?“
Leonora LaPeter Anton and her father, Bob Bohen.
I am Bob Bohen’s only child, so there was no one else to confer with when I brought him down to Florida four years ago after several hospitalizations in Williamsburg, Va. He had lived there with his 99-year-old sister.
A prostate operation had failed, so he was tethered to a catheter bag. We stopped in the bathroom at South of the Border in South Carolina, and I struggled with the little knob to empty the urine from the swollen bag hanging near his calf.
Dad grew up in an Irish-Catholic family in Queens, N.Y., the youngest of four siblings. He played stick ball in a league and talks about the time he got a base hit off Whitey Ford, the Yankees pitcher nicknamed “The Chairman of the Board,” when they were kids.
We have always been close, visiting several times a year. But I hadn’t been around him regularly in 34 years.
Raising me alone in the late 1970s and early 1980s in Westport, Conn., he worked two part-time jobs — one as an insurance inspector and another inspecting high-rise elevators in Manhattan — so he could often be there when I got home from school. When I got my period for the first time, I went to him.
He’d bump into walls and trip and fall to make me laugh. He let me have huge sleepovers and was beloved among my friends. He took me out to eat. Every night.
But after being removed from his surroundings in Virginia, he grew so anxious that he shut down. I struggled to get anything beyond one-word replies from him as we drove into Florida and passed billboards that pitched Jesus, vasectomies and strip clubs.
At The Fountains in South Pasadena, he moved into a studio and got his meals in a dining room. Caregivers gave him his meds, helped him empty the catheter bag.
He sat in his apartment a lot, watching the Rays. He said he didn’t want any new friends.
I took him to a neurologist, who added a medication to help him walk better. I took him to a urologist, who put him on other pills and finally got rid of the catheter. He started taking a cognitive medication, Namzaric, which gave him back some words, elevated his thoughts.
“There’s too much obsession with doctors,” he said one day as we sat waiting in a gray-washed office. “We should accept death as a codicil of life.”
Another time, he gazed out at a brilliant orange-red sunset over the smooth expanse of water outside The Fountains and said: “The sky is shouting at the peacefulness. It’s a gift.”
Every day, he wanted me to take him for dinner at a British pub, The Horse & Jockey, which he called “Boots and Saddles.” He liked the wooden booths and made friends with the waiters and waitresses, always greeting them warmly.
He told funny stories about his new home. There was a woman who said she would sit on his lap if he came up to her apartment. He turned her down. A man with a walker had rushed for a seat at his lunch table, knocking over a woman in a wheelchair. Another woman waved at him with her thumb and fingers flapping like a finger puppet; he waved back, his thumb and fingers flapping.
Later, we started going to Fortunato’s across the street. He’d get in the car and say “bread,” meaning he wanted to go there because they served it with each meal. It got to where they brought us our Diet Cokes, his with no ice, before we even sat down at the table.
He went from walking in on his own, to using a cane, then a walker and finally, recently, I pushed him up to the table in a wheelchair.
As the Parkinson’s robbed him of his mind, he struggled with words, and he had trouble swallowing.
“How come you are the third leg under this table?” he asked me one time over scrambled eggs and home fries.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he replied.
It’s strange to sit across the dinner table from your father night after night for four years and realize you went all those years without this, and now, it’s back and you really enjoy it. You get to know each other again. You build connection. You laugh.
I needed him, too.
Only now, things were about to change again.
Bob Bohen (Photo/Leonora LaPeter Bohen)
As I stand in my father’s new room, I’m thinking this is quite possibly the last time I’ll see him. I think to myself that I’m being melodramatic. My hands are slathered in hand sanitizer. I’d even wiped down my car keys.
I tell him I think his memory care unit is the safest place for him right now. He’s on a contained floor with 15 or so residents. He was getting thinner, but I’d never seen him so energized. His routine included bingo and Jeopardy during the day and sitting with the others every night watching a movie. He said he was talking more, and he wanted to be an inspiration.
“I’m so happy, because I’m doing something that’s vivid and strong,” he said. “I’m helping people.”
“How are you helping them?” I asked.
He said people go through stages of life — school, maybe college, a job — and “their personality is absorbed.” He wants to help them find it again. “I want them to see that they can do that,” he said.
My heart fluttered, heavy.
He wanted to know if we could have dinner together. I said no, we couldn’t.
“Who’s going to take care of me?” he asked.
I told him he wouldn’t be alone. It would be OK. They would take care of him.
“Who?” he asked.
I told him we would talk on the phone every day. I worried, though, that he’d forget why I wasn’t there and think I abandoned him.
I told him I loved him.
“I love you,” he said, “and I want you to be happy.”
I have no symptoms of the virus, and I longed to embrace him. But I gave him an air hug. Just in case.
Doris Ghitelman took this photo yesterday at the Compo Beach pavilion. A few hours later, town officials closed the parking lot until further notice. “I guess the person who left this can no longer self-medicate there,” Doris says.
In mid-morning, Compo Beach resident Jim Hood and his dog Koda were the only ones there. A couple of hours later, cars were parked all along Soundview Drive.
Meanwhile, families on Pheasant Lane practiced social distancing. They were both social and distant, while awaiting a dinner delivery from Kawa Ni. (Photo/Adam Goldberg)
Last night, Nicole Straight sat home feeling anxious.
Her daughter — suddenly home from college — was working a volunteer shift at EMS.
Food Rescue US — the app that uses volunteer drivers to move food that would otherwise be thrown away by restaurants to shelters, kitchens and pantries, and which Nicole runs locally — had gotten slammed. Longtime generous donors were suddenly shutting down.
As she chatted with a friend — an ER nurse at Norwalk Hospital — Nicole had an idea. What if she could get meals from a local restaurant, and bring them to first responders?
She called Bill Taibe — owner of The Whelk, Jesup Hall and Kawa Ni, who had just announced an end to in-house dining. He was happy to help.
Nicole told him to make whatever he wanted, and pack it individually. She’d bring it to Westport EMS.
Bill calculated the cost at $15 a meal. Nicole posted that information on Facebook. She hoped to get enough donations so she would not have to cover 50 meals — $750 — herself.
Since last night, almost $6,000 has poured in.
Old Post Tavern in Fairfield asked if they could help. An ICU nurse from Norwalk Hospital said her crew would love a meal.
Nicole’s daughter contacted the crew chief from Norwalk EMS. Tomorrow, they and the ICU unit will get 70 meals, courtesy of Old Post Tavern.
Nicole is also setting up meals for Trumbull EMS, Bridgeport Hospital’s ER and ICU, and Bridgeport’s Harding High School Adversity to Prosperity program, which keeps at-risk youth off the streets and involved in sports.
She is looking for first responders who’d like a meal, and restaurants who would like to help (and be paid, of course).
Meanwhile, Nicole is setting up a GoFundMe page, so other communities can also support both restaurants and first responders.
Until then, people can Venmo @nicole-straight. She’ll buy meals from local restaurants — and bring them to first responders around Fairfield County — as long as she can.
Crew chief Rob Pocius accepts a special delivery at Westport EMS.
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If you’re not struggling to put food on the table, consider helping others by donating food, toiletries, paper goods, diapers or gift cards. These supplies can be dropped off at 1864 Post Road in Darien or 76 South Main Street in Norwalk from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon, and after hours by appointment. For more details, call 203-621-0703.
If your employer only permits you to work part-time instead of full-time or you work multiple jobs and your full-time employer closes, you may be eligible for partial unemployment.
“It’s really cool,” he says. “There are so many smart and talented people here, so there are lots of chances to learn new things and get better at the craft.”
