Carl Salsedo, Board of Selectmen
Meet the Candidates
Carl Salsedo, Board of Selectmen
October 13, 2011
Candidate Carl Salsedo
Board of Selectmen Town of Burlington
Opening Remarks
Good Evening:
I am Carl Salsedo, a resident of Burlington since 1977 and a faculty member at the University of Connecticut. I bring to Burlington 36 years of academic as well as practical experience working on sustainable and environmental issues with students, home owners, municipalities, associations and the Connecticut Green Industries.
I am running to ensure that our quality of life in Burlington is preserved and development is planned to conserve the natural beauty of our community.
My vision is to develop a distinctive sense of place for the residents of Burlington via the environment and its historical heritage through:
- Preserving open space and the natural beauty of our town
- Preserving critical environmental and agricultural areas in Burlington
- Protecting and managing residential neighborhoods
- Addressing community facility and recreational needs
- Promoting sustainable initiatives encouraging green businesses, housing and land use.
I am committed to volunteerism and community service. I presently serve as chairman of the Burlington Conservation Commission as well as the President of the Burlington Historical Society. This is a testimony to my vested interest in our community.
Concluding Remarks
As I stated earlier, I believe in volunteerism and community service. It is the backbone of our cultural and civic organizations, it helps define who we are and what we aspire to be as Americans. My wife Beth and I were Peace Corps Volunteers in the 1960’s answering President Kennedy’s call to service. We have spent a lifetime serving on different boards and committees and I am presently a Carnegie endowed Service Learning Fellow at the University of Connecticut.
Beth and I have lived in Burlington since 1977. By the way, we still live in the same house where we terraced a hillside to create sustainable gardens. A veritable laboratory, my yard is the basis for the Gardening with Nature series on Connecticut Public Television as well as the Garden Conservancy’s Open Days Program where I promote “Landscape Sustainability”.
Why did we stay in one place?
Best-selling author Michael Pollan writing in “Second Nature A Garden’s Education” as well as environmental philosopher Kenneth Jackson’s “Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the U.S.”, both assert that “the average suburban dweller lives in one place for a period of 4 to 5 years making any relationship with the land superficial and peripheral.”
In my own book, “Gardening: Cultivating an Enduring Relationship with Nature” I state that “Gardening is a way to deepen a relationship to the land or the place in which you live, with what would otherwise be a transitory relationship”.
Well we all cannot be gardeners (although Bruce Butterfield of the National Gardening Association told me that 116 million households in the US are involved in some form of gardening). But we can all appreciate and protect the beautiful environment that Burlington has.
It is so beautiful here…that is why Beth and I stayed!
My hope is to foster and maintain a sense of place for Burlington and its residents. Our wonderful quality of life will be preserved by protecting Burlington’s environment.
I can promise you that I will work towards ensuring an open and transparent dialog based on critical thinking and I will support checks and balances to solve the problems of our town.
To conclude Mark Twain recommended “Always do right. It will please some people and astonish the rest.”
