Hartford Clean-Up Day! Saturday May 3rd from 9am to 12 noon. Please come and help clean our community and town roads of roadside litter.

Free lunch at noon for the volunteers. All you can eat HotDogs, Chips, Soda, and IceCream.

We will meet at 9am at the Hartford Town Barn. At this time we will issue Town Roads to groups of clean up volunteers (we only do Town Roads, we do not do County or State roads.

Any children should be accompanied by an adult.

We need as many people and trucks as we can get. Please bring a pair of gloves and dress for the weather.

Questions? Call Highway Superintendent Greg Brown 632-5255
Rain Date is Saturday May 10th.

Hartford EWaste Collection Day! Saturday May 3rd from 9am to 12 noon

The Town of Hartford will partner with Earth Waste & Metal to provide an EWaste Collection Day for the citizens and businesses of Hartford free of charge at the Hartford Town Barn.

EWaste (Electronic Waste) is basically anything with electronics powered by A/C or D/C.

New This Year: 1) EWaste items with a freon refrigerant component like window airconditioners or refrigerators are acceptable.
2) Wet Lead Acid batteries similar to what you have in a car or tractor are acceptable.

Volunteers to assist with the collection and help unload cars at the Town Barn are welcome.

Unacceptable for collection are light bulbs, lamps, and Dry Cell Batteries (9v, D, C, AA, etc.).

Questions? Call Supervisor Dana Haff 632-9178
Rain Date is Saturday May 10th.

The Hartford Food Pantry, located in the Baptist Church on Main St, distributes food to the needy. The Pantry is in need of volunteer workers to help it operate every other Saturday (April 5, April 19, May 3, etc.) from 9 – 10:30am. If you have the time available and can help, please call Pete Klaiber 632-9267.

The below story is in Thursday’s Post Star newspaper. Dana

HARTFORD — Peter Klaiber, director of the Hartford Food Pantry, had seen stories in the national press about people donating money so needy children could pay for their school lunches.

So when Stewart Shop’s contacted him about a $400 donation from its Stewart’s Holiday Match Program, he put two and two together.

The donation, which comes from the company matching customers’ donations during the holidays, is intended for local residents 18 and under, and the shop sits directly across Route 40 from the high school.

In a letter to Stewart’s, Klaiber summed up the pantry’s situation.

“While our pantry served 685 households in 2013 consisting of 2,229 family members (approximately 50 percent being children), we serve families not only from Hartford but throughout Washington County. We are one of the few area pantries with no residency requirement. If you need help, we will do our best to help. We understand people don’t come to a pantry because they want to.

“Having said all that, we challenged ourselves as to how we could do something to directly benefit the children of Hartford,” he wrote.

When Klaiber looked at local issues, and recalled something he has seen on national news, he asked Stewart’s if the money could be used to reduce the lunch charges for those students and families who may have struggled at times paying for lunch.

“This is a way to ensure your donation directly benefits the youth of Hartford. Your donation to us will still be going for food, only difference being we will have the school/cafeteria administer on our behalf.”

Klaiber, who said he saw this as an effective way for the food pantry to fulfill it’s goals and those of the company’s, received permission from the school and Stewart’s, and the program will go into effect.

“The Hartford Central School District is extremely grateful for the generous donation from Stewart’s and the Hartford Food Pantry,” Superintendent Andrew Cook said. “The donated money will be used to help reduce the lunch charges for those students and families who may have struggled, at times, paying for their lunch.”

Town Supervisor Dana Haff is a regular customer at the store.

“I am grateful to Stewart’s for caring about the Hartford community,” Every year when Stewart’s has this fund drive, I always donate the change I get back from the cash register into the can. I never really knew where the money went but I trusted Stewart’s to find a worthy cause.”

The food pantry is in the Baptist Church and is open from 9 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. Saturdays.

I have started posting photos of lost or stray dogs that are picked up in Hartford in an effort to help reunite these lost pets with their owners. It is very important that your dog has a collar with Hartford Dog license which would make finding the owner a snap. A microchip implanted will help if the dog happens to be found without a collar.

I think it is a very good idea to have a good quality digital photo of your dog saved on a computer or smartphone so you that social media can be used to help look for the dog.

If your pet ever becomes lost, and you email me the photo and description I will help you get the word out. My home email is [email protected] Regards, Dana

Post Star newspaper 4/2/14

Hartford keeping an eye on its dogs.

Hartford Supervisor Dana Haff has entered the lost dog business.

Haff, who posts to his blog and Facebook probably more than any other supervisor, has been issuing what he calls “Doggie Amber Alerts” whenever he is notified of a found dog.

Hartford’s Dog Control Officer, Nancy Quell (692-2840) picks up the lost dogs and then emails him a photo with description. “I take this photo with description and send out an eblast to my “Hartford Group” email list of 110 Hartford citizen email addresses. I also put it on my personal Facebook page and the Town Clerk puts it on the Town of Hartford FaceBook page.”

The two recent dogs were a Puggle (cross between a Pug/Beagle) and just yesterday a Cocker Spaniel, and one of them was quickly returned to its owner.

— Bill Toscano