Federal EPA Salutes Eight in CT for Protecting Environment

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has honored eight Connecticut individuals, businesses and state and municipal agencies for their work to protect and sustain the region's natural resources. Hartford's Betsey Wingfield, who works in the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection; Anthony Leiserowitz, of the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies in New Haven; and Kevin Taylor of the Waterbury Development Corp., were individual honorees.

In the environmental, community, academia and nonprofit category, among those honored were:

Long Island Sound Study Citizens Advisory Committee  (Curt Johnson and Nancy Seligson, co-chairs): The volunteers of the Long Island Sound Study Citizens Advisory Committee have helped bring together a unified group of people dedicated to improving water quality in the sound. This group includes volunteers from community organizations, businesses, educational organizations, environmental groups and local government. Together these groups developed “SoundVision,” a community blueprint for clean water, healthy habitats, and economically strong communities.

Goodwin College: In 2005, Goodwin College announced dramatic plans to build a riverfront campus along Riverside Drive in East Hartford. With the help of EPA and other agencies, Goodwin created a new campus community with educational, economic, and environmental benefits for the region and beyond. The effort involved demolishing more than 30 above-ground oil tanks and other defunct industrial installations before redeveloping a formerly unusable industrial area. Late 2008, the college opened the 109,000 square-foot academic center. A year later, it rolled out its environmental studies degree program, which took advantage of access to the river and undeveloped flood plains for study of river ecology. In 2010, the Connecticut River Academy, an environmentally-themed magnet high school, also opened at the River Campus in a temporary space.

Other honorees were the Connecticut Department of Public Health's Drinking Water Section, Danbury's Ethan Allen Interiors Inc. and Greenwich Hospital (Thomas Lazzaro, John Huber).

Norwalk hotel operator HEI Hospitality LLC received an Energy Star Award.