At its Annual Board Meeting on June 24, the West Haven Community House inducted a new president and two new board members.
Bill Heffernan, Community House Board President since June 2018, turned the gavel over to Katie Farrell, the new president of the board of directors. Katie is a Chief Social Worker with the State of Connecticut division of Public Defender Services and has served on the board of directors since 2008, most recently as the First Vice President for the past 3 years and chair of the board’s Fund Development Committee. She has been instrumental in facilitating fundraising events including the agency’s Night at the Races and Rock & Stroll Fun Walk and Music Festival.
Before introducing the new board members, Heffernan briefly looked back at the recently completed 2020-21 fiscal year sighting how the agency rose above the challenges of the last year while adjusting program operations and staffing, as well as finding innovative ways to provide uninterrupted and critically needed services for children in the Head Start pre-school, school-age students in the agency’s Children and Youth Services programs and people served in Community Connections’ Day and Residential programs for adults with intellectual disabilities.
“The Community Connections staff did an excellent job ensuring day-to-day, 24/7 coverage at the seven residential sites keeping clients engaged and healthy day in and day out while unable to attend daily programs, enjoy outings or have family visits. The Day program reopened in early summer 2020 with safety measures in place for both staff and clients”, said Heffernan. “In addition, the agency had to adapt teaching strategies, maintain enrollment, and provide access to quality learning opportunities in their Head Start and Children and Youth Services programs while constantly adjusting to new state, local and federal guidelines and safety requirements”, he continued.
New board members inducted that evening include Patricia Fusco, retired teacher from West Haven Board of Education, and Michael Last, State of CT Agricultural Experiment Station’s chief financial officer.
In addition to inducting new members at the Annual Meeting fiscal year 2020-21, board officers were named with John Onofrio as first vice president, Ron Quagliani as second vice president, Jim Turcio as treasurer, Gene Sullivan as secretary and Jay Brennan as assistant secretary.