Chris Shortell For Wallingford Town Council

One of my votes for Wallingford Town Council will be going to Republican candidate Chris Shortell. He is a dynamic and well established candidate who offers a variety of useful ideas.  He has done  superb work in my opinion as a member of the Wallingford Town Council  He is a family man with two wonderful children.  

I recently got a chance to discuss some issues and ideas with Chris.
The first area we discussed were some of his accomplishments with the Town Council. He led the effort to get Community Pool open longer this season working with the Mayor and Councilor Cervoni and the rest of the Council to find the dollars to keep the pool open to Labor Day.  He was able to do it without raising taxes; repurpose some other funding, including the proposed TC raise.
In the area of Public safety we discussed two issues here:  His concern about the staffing of our police force for several years.  In 2017, Chief Wright admitted during the budget sessions that he wanted more officers, but was afraid to ask given the state’s economic climate.  That budget cycle, Shortell motioned (and Councilor Laffin seconded) to give him two more officers.  They couldn’t get the votes, but they are both convinced it helped him pave the way to get more the last two budget cycles. We’ve now added 4 officers and the Chief feels we are in a much better place.  The increased staff gives him flexibility with patrols, especially at night with the car break-ins.  The added cost to taxpayers is around $16 a month vs. two years ago.   We were both in agreement that it is worth it—public safety is our primary job.  Shortell also feels that Councilor Laffin deserves credit on this issue also.

The other public safety issue is the online transactions safe zone.  People use social media to buy/sell stuff…but then you may end up meeting complete strangers in parking lots or other obscure places.  He approached Chief Wright a few years ago and suggested that we use the Police station parking lot as a designated “safe zone” for online transactions.  West Hartford and other towns had done this, and he agreed. 

A big issue that I have been impressed with has been the modernizing of the town and BOE insurance plans. He has been a vocal advocate of the Town and Board shifting to H.S.A. plans.  He has been the most vocal on this one.  We are making progress—he believes all of the collective bargaining units now offer the HSA, at least as an option.  The bad news is that on the BOE side, the HSA plan is very, very rich and still needs some work.  And on the town side, while their version of the plan is more cost effective to tax payers, they don’t structure the payroll contribution to motivate people to choose it.  He has been beating the drum on this for four years (six, actually, counting the BOE), and will continue to do so in the future.

Some future issues include for example Public Safety:  He is concerned about the aging police station.  Nobody is talking about this (yet) but it’s an issue that’s coming.  He is against satellite police offices, as some members of the public and other candidates are advocating for. He does not see the economic value in those and I will agree with him on that issue.

He also favors a new pool and to continue the tradition of the Community Pool that the town has had for 50 years.

A centralized High School has caused great debate this year. Shortell will not support one high school at a cost of $120 million and the proposals are ridiculous.  The goal should be saving money—that’s the only way to make consolidating high schools work.  And unfortunately, that’s not what is being proposed, for the most part.

It was refreshing for me to speak with Chris and discuss his views.  

His website for more information is www.ckshortell.com

I feel Chris Shortell would be an excellent candidate for Town Council.  I urge fellow Wallingford voters to vote for him and re elect him in November.