Torrington council authorizes mayor to submit up to seven federal funding requests, including $54M stormwater ask

Torrington’s mayor and city council on March 6 approved a resolution authorizing the mayor to submit a slate of community project funding requests to U.S. Representative Hayes’ office for Fiscal Year 2027, including a large stormwater and river-wall stabilization package.

Economic development director William Wallik told the council the city must file submissions by March 11 and that each representative may forward a maximum of 20 projects to the House Appropriations Committee, so Torrington had to prioritize its most competitive applications. “There’s billions of dollars on the table,” Wallik said, adding that Torrington would compete across the Fifth Congressional District.

The council authorized the mayor to adopt resolution No. 143-287 and to submit the projects listed in a March 6 memo from Wallik and public works director Jamie Sakura. Wallik described a starting formulation that bundles the city’s state-mandated MS4 stormwater capital work with river-levy repairs into a combined request of roughly $54 million; he said the $49 million figure cited for MS4 work represents a five-year capital planning estimate, while the levy repairs are estimated at about $5 million. Wallik also said the city has limited time to refine match calculations and that award amounts would change the required local match.

Wallik shared an updated, seven-item list of project requests that staff placed on the draft resolution during the meeting. As presented to the council the items and staff-estimated requests were: MS4/stormwater and Naugatuck river-wall stabilization (transcript shows a top-line figure written as roughly 50,470,000 but formatting in the record is inconsistent), demolition of the Stone Hempy property ($2.5 million), additional funding for the Hunter Franklin Drive housing project ($4.3 million), traffic-light upgrades listed under the police department ($30 million), downtown streetscape and Franklin closet improvements ($250,000), veterans building boiler infrastructure improvements ($220,000), and a federally mandated drone replacement program ($500,000). Wallik and staff cautioned that the MS4 number is still being refined and could rise as catch-basin counts are finalized.

Councilwoman Rouette asked for clarification on how much the city intended to request for each project. Wallik said department heads supplied the requested congressional amounts but stressed that those figures are not the total project budgets and that the city would calculate any required matches after awards are known. Jason, a public works staffer, warned the MS4 estimate was “a little loose” and would likely change.

Council members voted to approve the resolution and to permit the mayor to submit the applications. The mayor and staff noted a minor clerical correction to the resolution date (changed to 2026) before voting.

Next steps: staff will finalize submission materials and transmit them to Representative Hayes’ office by the March 11, 5:00 p.m. deadline. The council’s authorization allows staff to request up to the amounts listed in the memo; final award amounts and any required local matches will depend on the federal appropriations process.