Mayor Leclerc's Update on East Hartford Recovery Team

East Hartford continues to operate during this challenging time. We can assure the public that our employees are working tirelessly to ensure continuity of our town operations.

Our Unified Command Team and our Preparedness Teams continues to meet multiple times per week in order to address situations that are unfolding at a constant pace, to keep current with any new Executive Orders and decisions from the State and Federal levels, and share information regarding local areas of concern.

In order to mirror the State actions which has formed Connecticut Recovers, the Town has launched the creation of a team of employees focused on our town’s recovery, which began meeting in April.  The Recovery Team is made up from representatives from our town departments including Public Facilities, Health, Youth Services, Social Services, Parks and Recreation, Library, and the Board of Education among others.  The Team is being led by our Development Director, Eileen Buckheit. 

This approach has been developed from experience with previous natural disasters such as Superstorm Sandy and will use guiding principles from these long-term disaster recovery effort.  These natural disaster responses have taught us that recovery has many facets and need to remain in place for long periods of time as the community assesses the current and ongoing damages as well as reacting to new needs as they arise.

We will be forming subcommittees under the Recovery Team to address the effects of this pandemic on our town and our community.  Among many topics, we will examine its effect on our small businesses, religious institutions, non-profits, explore financial recovery tools, public health priorities, public buildings and how our interaction with public may change, both in the short term and the long term.  In short, these issues are extensive and will require a great deal of thought and consideration.  In many cases, we will need the input from our residents and assistance in communicating these policies to our community-at-large.

An additional Logistics Team has been created to source materials and to ensure collective organization and management of town wide purchasing.  Centralizing the management of logistics activities can produce a number of benefits including elimination of redundant efforts, increase purchasing controls, improved transparency and streamlined processes.

Please know that we are working tirelessly to continue to protect our community and employees, and to lead as well as assist our residents and our businesses during this very trying time.  Your safety is our utmost priority and as we move into recovery, safety will remain our priority.  Please continue to use our social media, and our town website to obtain the latest information and I look forward to updating you on our recovery.