There are extra police patrols at schools in Middletown Thursday after a staff member at Woodrow Wilson Middle School received a suspicious phone call, according to the mayor’s Facebook page.

Mayor Dan Drew posted on Facebook that the staff member received an “indirect and non-specific suspicious phone call” on a personal cell phone Thursday morning.

The mayor posted that administrators at Middletown public schools and Middletown police do not believe there is any danger, nor was a threat made, but there will be additional police patrols at schools today as a precaution.

Schools will run on normal scheduled and visitors will be closely questioned and monitored.

Two people have been taken to the hospital after a serious crash on Gold Star Highway in Groton and part of the road is closed.

Groton Town Police said two vehicles collided on Route 184, or Gold Start Highway, near Mill Pond Road, just after 11 a.m. and one of the drivers suffered serious injuries.

Both drivers have been taken to Lawrence + Memorial Hospital.

Route 184 is closed in both directions between Gungywamp Road and Route 117 and police are asking people to avoid the area and seek alternate routes.

Whether it’s the news stories you hear on an almost daily basis or those alarming letters you receive in the mail from your bank, one thing is clear: Cyber criminals are constantly trying to steal our personal information.

Those hijacked Social Security numbers, credit card data and account passwords often end up on a place called the Dark Web.

It’s something you’ve probably heard about, perhaps during TV commercials, but might not know much about.

So what exactly is this mysterious online world, and how do you get there?

For the answer to that question, the NBC10 Boston Investigators sat down with Andrei Barysevich, the director of advanced collection for Recorded Future, a Somerville-based cyber intelligence company.

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In less formal terms, Barysevich describes himself as an "in-house spy," someone who spends his days surfing the Dark Web and looking for important clues.

So what exactly is the Dark Web?

"You can pretty much find anything," Barysevich said. "Stolen identities, credit card numbers, compromised data or weapons and drugs."

Although you can’t get to the Dark Web via traditional browsers like Google, it isn’t that difficult to access with readily available online tools. And while not everything that goes on there is illegal, much of it operates like a cyber black market. CNBC put together this helpful explainer on why people use the Dark Web and how it keeps user identities and locations anonymous.

"You’d be surprised about how many people use the Dark Web on a daily basis," Barysevich said.

In the past two years, Barysevich has gone from a team of one to a team of several dozen cyber intelligence analysts, combing through more than 2 million Dark Web sources per week.

The company’s growth shows there is a significant demand in the Boston region as companies look for guidance about where their security systems are vulnerable so they can stay one step ahead of cyber thieves.

The employees, typically fluent in several foreign languages, act like "flies on the wall" in Dark Web online forums, Barysevich said, attempting to gather information about what’s being bought and sold. Occasionally, they engage with the bad actors, but are very careful not to cross a line.

"From the first day, we said we are going to do this in a way that’s legal" said Christopher Ahlberg, CEO of Recorded Future. "Cyber security has grown incredibly in the past few years. It’s the idea of being able to catch cyber threats before they hit you. To do that, you need to infiltrate the places that bad guys hang out."

When valuable information is uncovered, Recorded Future told NBC10 Boston it shares the details with the pertinent parties, whether it’s a government agency, financial institution or law enforcement. One notable example was when the company spotted a hacker selling sensitive documents about military drones.

During a visit to their office in April, Barysevich took the NBC10 Boston Investigators for a quick tour of the Dark Web.

It was truly stunning to see. On one site, a simple drop-down menu allowed users to buy stolen accounts from almost any online site imaginable: Amazon, Airbnb, Instagram or Netflix. And it was all available with a simple "pick and click."

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Just as there are so-called "gateway drugs," Barysevich described the Dark Web as a gateway to cyber crime. For instance, a single stolen Netflix account for $3 might later grow into an online mastermind selling drugs or counterfeit cash overseas.

"Someone might start with small, almost innocent things," Barysevich said. "But then he develops his skills and engages in different schemes. Eventually he’s doing completely illegal things and making millions of dollars."

On one disturbing site, Barysevich showed NBC10 Boston Investigator Ryan Kath how easy it is to buy the Social Security number of almost anyone in the United States. Using one of Recorded Future’s accounts to pay the $3 charge, Kath plugged in his name.

After a search that only took a few seconds, Kath’s personal information appeared on the screen.

Barysevich said everyone should assume their information was at one point stolen and is available on the Dark Web.

Despite that ominous statement, he said there are a number of things consumers can do to reduce their risk:

• Freeze your credit report, something that can be done for free

• Activate text and email alerts for activity on your bank accounts

• Question why you need to provide a Social Security number or copy of your driver’s license when you visit the doctor or dentist

• Don’t use the same password for multiple online accounts

Barysevich emphasized this last tip the most, saying it is the most common mistake he sees. For a few dollars, consumers can instead use a password manager app or a program that provides a unique password for each online site they frequent. It’s an inexpensive strategy that can pay off big.

While some consumers might want to throw up their hands in frustration, Ahlberg — the Recorded Future CEO — said not to give up the fight. The goal is to decrease the odds that you’ll be cyber thieves’ next target.

"You just have to be the second-slowest," Ahlberg explained. "When the bear starts chasing you, it’s important to be the second-slowest because the bear will kill the slowest."

Ryan Kath can be reached at ryan.kath@nbcuni.com. You can also follow him on Twitter or connect on Facebook.

A D.C. boy's dream to produce and direct his own movie has come true — and he's only 10 years old.

Mason Bronner put his imagination to work to create an entire world of characters and stories while he spent countless hours battling leukaemia at Children's National.

"I had a lot of free time in the hospital," Bronner told News4.

The Make-a-Wish Mid-Atlantic Chapter helped bring his superhero story to the big screen by working with D.C.'s film community. Bronner's wish to make the movie was the organization's 10,000th wish.

To make the film, Make-a-Wish brought together about 150 local professionals in the filmmaking industry. Bronner got to work in casting, studio filming and workshopping with a screenwriter.

His favorite part of the process, though?

"I liked when I was hanging out with the people who helped the actors do stunts," Bronner said.

Bronner's movie features a team of supervillains who band together to defeat an even more powerful villain and save their city. Asked about his favorite character, Bronner said he couldn't choose.

"I do not have a favorite, I do love them all," Bronner said. 

His film "The Fallen" premiered Wednesday night at the Uptown Theater in Northwest D.C., red carpet and all. The film is now live and available on YouTube.

Watch the trailer for the film below:

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Lawmakers will not be voting on the state’s vaccination policy until they get more data from the state Department of Public Health on how to increase vaccination rates in school districts and schools with high vaccine exemption rates. 

A news release from lawmakers says the Department of Public Health will report back to the General Assembly no later than Jan. 1, 2020 and there will be no vote until that information comes in. 

Legislative leaders are asking what statutory authority the department needs to increase vaccinations rates in schools and how the legislature should handle unvaccinated children who are currently enrolled in schools to protect children who cannot be vaccinated due to medical conditions such as immune system disorders and/or risk of allergic reactions. 

They are also asking whether religious exemption should be removed from statute or is there an alternative that will similarly increase vaccination rates in under-vaccinated schools? 

Lawmaker were holding hearings on ways to stop outbreaks, including removing a religious exemption, in the wake of one of the worst measles outbreaks in years.  

The state Department of Public Health recently released data on the immunization rates for the state’s public and private schools and more than 100 Connecticut schools fall under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommended 95 percent immunization rate for measles, mumps, rubella.

Mail was stolen from United States postal boxes in Wethersfield and this is at least the fourth Connecticut town where similar thefts have happened. 

Police said they were called to the Wethersfield Post Office at 67 Beaver Road around 9:30 a.m. Thursday after the blue mailboxes on the side of the street were broken into and a large amount of mail was taken. 

The last time mail had been collected was around 5 p.m. on Wednesday and police are asking anyone who put mail into the two street side collection boxes between 5 p.m. on May 15 and before 9 a.m. Thursday to call the United States Postal Inspection Service. 

Police are also urging anyone who used the mailboxes during that time frame to contact whoever you were sending mail to and notify them of the theft. 

Police said anyone affected to reference WPD Case #1900007042/US Postal Inspection Service Case #2779914-MT. 

Police in several towns are investigating the theft of mail from postal boxes in their towns as well, including Plainville, Newington and Newtown. 

Wethersfield police are working with other local departments that have had similar cases recently.

A Massachusetts teacher is being held on bail after police say he left a live round of ammunition in a stairwell Thursday morning which prompted a lockdown at Southbridge High School.

Alfred Purcell III, 57, of Woodstock, Connecticut, was arraigned in Dudley District Court on two counts of the unlawful possession of ammunition, two counts of carrying ammunition on school grounds, disturbing a school assembly, disorderly conduct, and disturbing the peace.

Police were called to Southbridge High School at about 8:12 a.m. after Purcell told staff he had found one live round of 9mm ammunition in the rear stairwell.

As a precaution, school officials immediately placed the school on lock down and called police. The lock down lasted about an hour.

Upon a review of surveillance video, authorites said Purcell was observed standing in the stairwell and removing the live round of ammunition from his pocket. He was then allegedly seen dropping the ammunition on the floor of the stairwell and quickly leaf the area.

Authorities said Purcell then returned 10 minutes later where he stood over the ammunition and appeared to take a picture of it with his cellphone. Purcell then called to report it to school officials over his portable radio and returned to his classroom, according to police.

Southbridge Police Chief Shane Woodson said Purcell had been upset with the way another incident on Tuesday was handled. Woodson said some spent ammunition had been found at the school.

"He didn't think that we dealt with that incident in the proper fashion," said Woodson. "If you think we need metal detectors in this community and if you think there is any other safety issues in our schools you should go through the appropriate channels the police department the school and we will rectify any situations we deem unsafe, this is certainly not the proper way to do it."

As part of the investigation, police searched Purcell's vehicle and allegedly found 102 live rounds of .20 gauge shot gun ammunition in his trunk. Authorities said Purcell's license to carry a firearm was also expired.

Purcell was then taken into custody.

Authorities believe Purcell may have been drinking during Thursday's incident.

"He denied drinking any alcohol but I believe did he consume alcohol," said Woodson. "Was he intoxicated? I don't believe so."

In court, Purcell's attorney said it was all a misunderstanding.

Authorities said Purcell had been disciplined earlier this year for not being able to control his classroom but school officials said no background checks alerted them to anything out of the ordinary.

"To have someone I hired to ensure a safe environment for our children to do something like this is abhorrent," said Southbridge Superintendent Jeffrey Villar.

The judge ordered Purcell held on $500,000 bail. He was also ordered to stay away from the high school. It's unclear when is due back in court.

A man Meriden police were searching for in connection with a shooting last month was found in New York and will remain there until arrangements for his extradition are finalized, according to police. 

Police said they have a warrant for 29-year-old Justin Diaz, who they believe was involved in a shooting on April 19 on South First Street that almost took another man’s life.

Police said Diaz faces charges including assault in the first degree, carrying a pistol or revolver without a permit, unlawful discharge of a firearm and criminal use of a firearm. He was located in Bronx, New York on Thursday afternoon.

Police said they have been investigating after a bout of shootings in Meriden in the past several months and they are asking for the continued cooperation of the community while they prepare search warrants and conduct interviews.

Anyone with information is asked to contact Det. John Femia at 203-630-6219.

A 78-year-old man was seriously hurt when he was hit by a car in Putnam Sunday.

Police said the victim, identified as 78-year-old Putnam resident Richard Durocher, was hit while crossing Bridge Street in a crosswalk between Veteran’s Memorial park and Putnam Superior Court. He was taken to Day Kimball Hospital and later transferred to UMASS Memorial Hospital with serious injuries.

The driver was identified as an 81-year-old North Grosvenordale man. No charges have been filed and the case remains under investigation.

Any witnesses should contact Officer Kristopher Bernier at 860-928-6565.

President Donald Trump says he's created "maybe the best economy we've had in the history of our country," but his presidency has been taking a modest economic toll on his businesses, according to annual financial disclosure forms released Thursday.

Financial disclosure forms made public by the Office of Government Ethics show overall income from Trump's businesses in 2018 was roughly in line with the revenue he raked in in 2017 — but some of them took hits, NBC News reported.

His Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, which Trump refers to as "the winter White House," took in nearly $23 million in revenue, a drop of more than $2 million from the prior year.

One additional flu death has been reported in Connecticut, and 78 have been reported this flu season, according to the state Department of Public Health.

Of the 78 people who have died, 53 were 65 years old or us, 20 were 50 to 64 years old, four have been 25 to 49 years old and one was between 5 and 17.

There have been 10,135 influenza positive laboratory tests reported during the current season.

A 17-year-old boy has been charged in the shooting of a 14-year-old in New Haven earlier this month.

Police said the victim was shot on May 9 in a parking lot on Foxon Boulevard. He was treated and released from the hospital.

The suspect, who was not identified due to his age, was charged with first-degree assault.

Police said the suspect was arraigned Wednesday and is currently incarcerated in a state Department of Correction facility.

Two people were charged with prostitution following random inspections of massage parlors in Torrington Monday.

Police said detectives saw suspicious activity involving a customer and the owner of Graceful Massage Spa on New Harwinton Road.

Robert Phillips, 70, of Brookfield was charged with patronizing a prostitute. The spa owner, Ding Qingfen, 55, was charged with prostitution.

Both were released on a promise to appear and are due in court on May 28.

The Department of Labor and Department of Health also found violations at the spa that could result in fines, police said.

Jewish families in greater New Haven will soon need to find somewhere else to shop for Kosher food.

“I would love to see somebody else coming in takeover, the community needs this place,” said Rachel Hamenachem, co-owner of Westville Kosher Market on Amity Road.

Hamenachem and her husband have decided to close their business of 34 years at the end of the month.

“It was devastating because for those of us who are Kosher this is where we come for everything,” Karen Bogdanoff of Woodbridge said.

But the market isn’t just a place to buy Kosher meat, challah bread and Israeli food.

“It’s the center of the community people come in here they all know each other,” said Alan Lovins, who has been a customer since 1985. “The people who run this place have been willing and eager to be the center of the Jewish community.”

A notice on the front door lets customers know the last day for business will be Friday May 31, but the owners have also made personal calls to members of the community who have supported them for more than three decades.

“Well it wasn’t totally unexpected, but it was really sad for me,” Lovins said.

The past decade has been difficult for business, Hamenachem said.

“Stop & Shop opened has Kosher stuff, Trader Joe’s opened has Kosher stuff and the community trickled down,” she said. “People went to some other places, so we had our beautiful customers, but it wasn’t enough.”

But those other grocery stores don’t sell the Hamenachem’s homemade hummus.

“You don’t have to be Kosher, you don’t have to be Jewish and you definitely don’t need to eat meat to be able to eat my hummus,” Hamenachem said.

“Her hummus is the best ever outside of Israel,” Bogdanoff said.

After retiring, Hamenachem and her husband said they plan to split time between their home in Bethany and with family in Israel.

“We need to relax we need to go and see grandkids,” Hamenachem said.

Bogdanoff said she does not know where she’ll shop for Kosher food after May 31.

“I’m going to fill up my freezer and I’m going to eat more fish and maybe be a little more vegetarian and I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to do,” she said.

But she understands why now is the time for the owners to move on.

“I have a lot of respect for them,” Bogdanoff said. “They’ve serviced this community beautifully.”

To say Nicole Antaya is grateful to be graduating from Quinnipiac University this weekend would be an understatement.

“I’ve had to miss a lot of school in order go through very severe procedures and hospitalizations," Antaya said, "which is why I treasure school so much and graduating this Saturday is so incredible.”

Reaching this milestone has been six years in the making.

“So I would say for first semester or even year I had a backpack on one shoulder and oxygen tank on the other, trying to go to classes, trying,” Antaya recalled.

She was born with cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder that causes chronic lung infections and limits the ability to breathe.

“I would say June of 2015 my lung function dropped down to 18 percent,” Antaya said.

Six months to a year - that's how long doctors said she had to live. So Antaya moved with her mom to Durham, North Carolina in desperate need of two new lungs.

“Because otherwise the infected the lung would then infect the good lung and there would be no point in that,” she explained.

In August 2015, she underwent a double lung transplant at Duke University Medical Center that gave her a second chance at life.

“One hundred percent I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him and it was literally a stranger’s gift," Antaya said, "he didn’t know me, he didn’t have to check the box to become an organ donor but because he did I’m here.”

Antaya said she wrote a letter to the parents of the 17-year-old boy who donated her new lungs. He died in a car crash.

"Just expressing my like absolute humbled gratitude," she said, "and there’s no words you can really say to a family who is mourning because when I received the call that would save my life, Jordan’s family was receiving a devastated call.”

Antaya's road to recovery wasn't easy. After a month of intensive care, she had to learn to walk again.

“So just getting back on your feet again is literal, it’s a literal getting back on your feet again,” she said.

Since the transplant, she takes 76 pills daily to stabilize her blood pressure and prevent her body from rejecting the new organs.

After taking online courses and returning to campus a year and a half after the life-saving surgery, Antaya is ready to receive her bachelor's degree in psychology from Quinnipiac.

She has decorated in her graduation cap in honor of her donor.

“I know I will have Jordan’s spirit with me and so I want to accept that diploma for him ‘cause he never graduated from high school," Antaya said, "so when I reach for it I really want to like envelope his soul in that actual moment.”

At Quinnipiac, Antaya has started a chapter of Student Organ Donation Advocates (SODA).

After graduation this Saturday at the People's United Center on the York Hill campus, Antaya said she will continue her education in the master's in social work program at Southern Connecticut State University.

At least five of the last weekends had wet weather, including a washout on Mother’s Day.

Restaurant owners near the water or with large open patios, like Chris Henney who owns The River – A Waterfront Restaurant and Bar in Wethersfield, said that the constant cold and rainy days has kept his patio closed often.

“Essentially it takes our restaurant basically 300 seats to 180.”

While Henney can still operate his restaurant year round without the patio, places like Shad Row in Rocky Hill are seasonal and only have outdoor patio seating.

Owner Jenna Rosella said that she wanted to open much earlier in the spring but the weather has been consistently wet and cold.

“This year I wanted to open May 1, but that wasn’t in the cards with rain and chilliness. Then my goal was Mother’s Day, that didn’t work, now my goal is this Saturday,” said Rosella.

She hopes the forecast for sunshine and warmer temperatures will help keep her new restaurant opening for this Saturday May on schedule.

To check the latest forecast, click here.

I.M. Pei, the versatile, globe-trotting architect who revived the Louvre with a giant glass pyramid and captured the spirit of rebellion at the multi-shaped Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, has died at age 102.

Pei's death was confirmed Thursday by Marc Diamond, a spokesman for Pei's New York architectural firm, Pei Cobb Freed & Partners.

Pei's works ranged from the trapezoidal addition to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., to the chiseled towers of the National Center of Atmospheric Research that blend in with the reddish mountains in Boulder, Colorado.

His buildings added elegance to landscapes worldwide with their powerful geometric shapes and grand spaces. Among them are the striking steel and glass Bank of China skyscraper in Hong Kong and the Fragrant Hill Hotel near Beijing. His work spanned decades, starting in the late 1940s and continuing through the new millennium. Two of his last major projects, the Museum of Islamic Art, located on an artificial island just off the waterfront in Doha, Qatar, and the Macau Science Center, in China, opened in 2008 and 2009.

Pei painstakingly researched each project, studying its use and relating it to the environment. But he also was interested in architecture as art — and the effect he could create.

"At one level my goal is simply to give people pleasure in being in a space and walking around it," he said. "But I also think architecture can reach a level where it influences people to want to do something more with their lives. That is the challenge that I find most interesting."

Pei, who as a schoolboy in Shanghai was inspired by its building boom in the 1930s, immigrated to the United States and studied architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University. He advanced from his early work of designing office buildings, low-income housing and mixed-used complexes to a worldwide collection of museums, municipal buildings and hotels.

He fell into a modernist style blending elegance and technology, creating crisp, precise buildings.

His big break was in 1964, when he was chosen over many prestigious architects, such as Louis Kahn and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, to design the John F. Kennedy Memorial Library in Boston.

At the time, Jacqueline Kennedy said all the candidates were excellent, "But Pei! He loves things to be beautiful." The two became friends.

A slight, unpretentious man, Pei developed a reputation as a skilled diplomat, persuading clients to spend the money for his grand-scale projects and working with a cast of engineers and developers.

Some of his designs were met with much controversy, such as the 71-foot faceted glass pyramid in the courtyard of the Louvre museum in Paris. French President Francois Mitterrand, who personally selected Pei to oversee the decaying, overcrowded museum's renovation, endured a barrage of criticism when he unveiled the plan in 1984.

Many of the French vehemently opposed such a change to their symbol of their culture, once a medieval fortress and then a national palace. Some resented that Pei, a foreigner, was in charge.

But Mitterrand and his supporters prevailed and the pyramid was finished in 1989. It serves as the Louvre's entrance, and a staircase leads visitors down to a vast, light-drenched lobby featuring ticket windows, shops, restaurants, an auditorium and escalators to other parts of the vast museum.

"All through the centuries, the Louvre has undergone violent change," Pei said. "The time had to be right. I was confident because this was the right time."

Another building designed by Pei's firm — the John Hancock Tower in Boston — had a questionable future in the early 1970s when dozens of windows cracked and popped out, sending glass crashing to the sidewalks, during the time the building was under construction.

A flurry of lawsuits followed among the John Hancock Mutual Life Insurance Co., the glass manufacturer, and Pei's firm. A settlement was reached in 1981.

No challenge seemed to be too great for Pei, including the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which sits on the shore of Lake Erie in downtown Cleveland, Ohio. Pei, who admitted he was just catching up with the Beatles, researched the roots of rock 'n' roll and came up with an array of contrasting shapes for the museum. He topped it off with a transparent tent-like structure, which was "open — like the music," he said.

In 1988, President Reagan honored him with a National Medal of Arts. He also won the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize, 1983, and the American Institute of Architects Gold Medal, 1979. President George H.W. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1992.

Pei officially retired in 1990 but continued to work on projects. Two of his sons, Chien Chung Pei and Li Chung Pei, former members of their father's firm, formed Pei Partnership Archiitects in 1992. Their father's firm, previously I.M. Pei and Partners, was renamed Pei Cobb Freed & Partners.

The museum in Qatar that opened in 2008 was inspired by Islamic architectural history, especially the 9th century mosque of Ahmed ibn Tulun in the Egyptian capital of Cairo. It was established by the tiny, oil-rich nation to compete with rival Persian Gulf countries for international attention and investment.

Ieoh Ming Pei (pronounced YEE-oh ming pay) was born April 26, 1917, in Canton, China, the son of a banker. He later said, "I did not know what architecture really was in China. At that time, there was no difference between an architect, a construction man, or an engineer."

Pei came to the United States in 1935 with plans to study architecture, then return to practice in China. However, World War II and the revolution in China prevented him from coming back.

During the war, Pei worked for the National Defense Research Committee. As an "expert" in Japanese construction, his job was to determine the best way to burn down Japanese towns. "It was awful," he later said.

In 1948, New York City real estate developer William Zeckendorf hired Pei as his director of architecture. During this period, Pei worked on many large urban projects and gained experience in areas of building development, economics and construction.

Some of his early successes included the Mile High Center office building in Denver, the Kips Bay Plaza Apartments in Manhattan, and the Society Hill apartment complex in Philadelphia.

Pei established his own architectural firm in 1955, a year after he became a U.S. citizen. He remained based in New York City. Among the firm's accomplishments are the Jacob Javits Convention Center in New York City and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington. 

In Dallas alone, he designed Dallas City Hall, One Dallas Center, Energy Plaza, Fountain Place and the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, according to an item on Pei in the Dallas Morning News on his 100th birthday. 

Former national security adviser Michael Flynn told investigators that people linked to the Trump administration and Congress reached out to him in an effort to interfere in the Russia probe, NBC News reported, citing court papers.

The communications could have "affected both his willingness to cooperate and the completeness of that cooperation," special counsel Robert Mueller wrote in the court filings.

Flynn even provided a voicemail recording of one such communication, the court papers say. "In some instances, the SCO was unaware of the outreach until being alerted to it by the defendant," Mueller wrote.

The Town of Waterford is making firefighters in town decide whether they want to work part-time and get paid or fight fires as a volunteer.

Currently the town has overlap between part-time and volunteer firefighters.

First Selectman Dan Steward said the issue was raised after a local part-time firefighter requested to be paid for decades of volunteer service, citing a potential violation of an old federal labor law.

In response, Waterford’s Director of Fire Services Bruce Miller sent out a letter to 53 firefighters saying “In electing to serve as a paid, part-time member of the fire services, you will not be eligible to volunteer such services.

“That’s a significant decision to give up that kind of money but it’s based on my love of the service and the betterment of the community,” said Cohanzie Fire Co. Chief Todd Branche.

Branche is the volunteer chief at one of Waterford’s five private fire houses in town, where firefighters volunteer their services.

Waterford does not have its own town fire department but it does have nine full-time firefighters and part-time firefighters, according to Steward.

The town also supplies apparatus, training and equipment to the fire houses, he added.

Branche also works part-time for the town and said last year he made just over $30,000 doing that. But he is choosing to remain a volunteer because Branche said he’s committed to keeping the community safe.

“The earlier in the incident you are, the more significant impact you can make,” Branche said.

Steward said public safety remains the top concern for the town.

Three volunteer officers responded to Miller’s letter, so far, he said, and confirmed those three officers made the decision to continue as paid part-time employees for the town.

Republican lawmakers announced a five-step transportation plan Thursday, an alternative to the toll proposal supported by the governor and top Democrats.

Republicans have been united against proposals to add tolls in the state and argued that their plan is a “more layered solution” to the transportation problem.

Their plan has five key elements – to immediately invest in transportation over the next five years, to identify the state’s long-term transportation needs and have DOT submit specific plans, to develop a long-term strategy with the reestablishment of the Transportation Strategy and Advisory Board, to explore public private partnerships, and to address the five worst bridges in the state.

Lawmakers want to dedicate $375 million in General Obligation funding to transportation annually for the next five years. Combined with federal funding, that would mean a total of $1.9 billion for transportation annually.

Republicans said revenue for tolls wouldn't be a reality fo several years and that infrastruture investment needs to happen now.

"You are not taking money out of people's pockets and you are able to fund and invest in transportation immediately. we don't have to wait four or five years for toll money to come in or doesn't come in," Rep. Themis Klarides (R-Derby) a top Republican in the House, said.

The governor was critical of the Republican plan.

"They're saying let's do what we've been doing for 10 years only let's borrow another $375 million, put that on the credit card and let your kids pay for it because we can't figure out how we want to pay for it," Lamont said.

Democratic leadership says they're reviewing the details of the plan and that they prefer a bipartisan solution, but they continue to move forward on tolls.