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12/09/2015 07:30 AMWith a wistful smile, Carol Conklin—now Selectman Conklin—remembers fondly the wonder and joy of spending the summers of her youth at the family home in Cornfield Point.
“Growing up there each summer, it was the true experience of friendship. It was a great to have a pack of summer friends and also have your school year friends. We used to write letters to keep in touch with each other,” recalled Carol.
She and her Saybrook friends would collect S&H Green Stamps during the school year and at the start of the summer, bring them to the town’s S&H merchandise redemption center to get something special. They would go to Malloy’s on Main Street to pick out that season’s new raft or to Ed’s Enterprises to buy a bicycle. And all would eagerly await the day each year that the town’s mini-golf course finally opened.
When each summer season neared its end, everyone would go back-to-school shopping in town at Sage-Allen, Greenbergs, and Craigs.
“We stayed in Old Saybrook for the whole summer. My parents Marie and Anthony Rizzo were very active in the Cornfield Point Beach Association. When he died, my dad was the president. Now my husband Tim Conklin is the association president and I’m finishing up my term as president of the Cornfield Point Women’s Auxiliary Association,” says Carol.
For Carol, her summer stays didn’t end when she went to Bryant College to study accounting. Each summer she returned to town and worked at a summer job at Sage Allen department store.
“I learned great customer services skills there, made life-long friends, and learned a lot of great business lessons,” says Carol.
Over the past decade or so, Carol has lived full-time with her own family in Cornfield Point in the house next door to where she spent summers with her own parents.
Her career working with numbers in business began with a post as a unit supervisor with the Hartford Insurance Group. From there she moved to Black & Decker in Berlin where she worked as a general ledger supervisor. When the firm’s lock set division was sold, Carol decided to open her own small business, Sugarplums, a sweets and ice cream shop, on her hometown’s Main Street.
She describes herself as a people person who enjoyed meeting and getting to know townspeople including town officials who would walk from Town Hall and stop into her shop on Main Street.
When her daughter was born 13 years ago, she sold the business to spend more time with her. Once she entered school at five, Carol was ready to return to work, though she wanted a part-time commitment. Asked to take on the part-time job of Democratic registrar of voters, she accepted, and now has held the post for the past seven years.
“Typically, the registrar’s job required about eight hours work per week, outside of the election season when you may need to work every day,” says Carol.
By state statute, now that she’s been elected as town selectman, she can no longer serve as a registrar of voters. She can—and plans to—continue to work at the polls on election days.
The process of local government has always interested Carol.
“My goal is to write a political book—it will include humor—explaining how local government works. Topics like ‘What is a caucus?’ for example,” says Carol. “People only think about government at voting time, but there’s a process going on year-round that I want people to understand.”
To date, she says she’s drafted four chapters of her book about local government processes.
Carol brings to her new post of selectman her accounting training and experience as well as her personal knowledge of business and, in particular, the needs of her hometown’s business community.
“I’d like to make sure that residents understand the town businesses’ needs. For example, we have a big summer home population rather than mostly summer tourists. Businesses here will thrive differently depending on their target population. Some businesses would have trouble locating here because of seasonal cash flow,” says Carol. Success depends on “working together to get the right people and businesses to locate here so they can succeed.”
Carol worked on these issues for about five years when she served on the Connecticut River Valley and Shoreline Visitors Council in the 1990s. At that time, she also was in the Main Street Business Association, and after serving on the Board of the Old Saybrook Chamber of Commerce, became Chamber president. And when her daughter was at St. John’s School, Carol was a major volunteer.
Her real passion—and what she enjoys doing in her free time—is cooking and teaching others how to broaden their culinary skills. Through the Middlesex Adult Education program at Old Saybrook High School, for four years, she taught classes like Italian cooking, comfort food cooking, and holiday appetizers. That’s why her donation to St. John School auction was always a summer cookout at the beach for 12.
“Overall, I’m really grateful for all the times that people have asked me to be involved in projects or with the town. I’ve gotten to meet lots of people and learn their take on things. I’m a big believer in the idea that opportunities present themselves at the right time,” says Carol. “When it’s meant to happen, it’s the right time.”
So as Carol begins her service as selectman, she’s ready and eager to start—because it’s the right time.