Click here to see a few drawings we prepared for this weeks meeting- Its open to the public so please join us at 7PM this Wednseday

And to achieve these goals we have decided that in 2012, CCB needs to hit the waves and operate from a floating platform that may be brought along with our fleet to every harbor and port of call in Connecticut. 

First up we will make an effort to join Schooner Inc in New Haven Harbor this summer with the newest addition to our fleet, The CCB Floating Boat House. With big ideas and big plans on tap for the summer, we need to raise not-so-big funds by mobilizing and organizing. 

Join us this Wed at 85 Wall Street in Madison, CT for the CCB New Haven Intiative Organizational Meeting where a group of like minded individuals who make up the gress roots of CCB will meet to discuss how we will bring community boating with our fleet and floating boat house to New Haven in Summer 2012. 

Bring your friends, tell your neighbors and get on board as we open the waters of Connecticut to everyone for the lowest cost in the country! 

A great shot of the kids and Volunteers from 2010- Please donate what you can to keep this important resource available to all kids ages 8-18

And while we've got your attention, we wanted to share a little news about a really cool program we've been running despite the storms, funding woes and publicity blackout. 

The CCB/CSC Learn to Swim for $1 Program is fully operational and back for another season of swimming. This winter, we host the program on Wednesday nights at 5:00 PM at 1494 Main Street. Cost for this program is just $1 per night per student. 

What's more, due to the great success and great partneship between CCB. Shehan and New Beginnings Family Academy, we're once again kicking off Friday Night Swimming at the CSC Pool this March 1.

The reason we can charge such an affordable price and offer this service to so many kids for just a buck, who need this lesson so badly, is (a) the kindness of volunteer instructors from Fairifled Prep, the USCG and area colleges and (b) the kindness of donors who pay the bills and keep the lights on. 

We need all three this and every Wednesday and Friday- Kids, volunteers and donations so here's what to do any of the above applies to you:

1) Kids should call Shehan Center at (203) 336-4468 for forms, sign ups and schedules

2) Volunteers should email Sarah at motti.sarah@gmail.com to arrange schedules and sign ups.

3) Donors should click here to make an important contribution that may just say the life of a disadvantaged kid who might otherwise never learn to swim. 

">A albeit low-tech rendition of the the Floating Boat house Concept Please click to helpus reach our goal

We have made many strides in the last five years and are now at critical mass to become Connecticut’s only public-access fleet that serves a region with more than 1.6 million residents.

Within five years, Connecticut Community Boating will grow to a statewide organization hosting as many as five floating boat houses and public fleets around the State. Our first planned site will be in the Bridgeport Boat Basin at the mouth of the Pequonnock River. Here we will moor our prototype and the first of the fleet of Floating Boat Houses using our existing 20X40’ concrete float and a 14X24’ A-Frame prefabricated building. We will also create a mooring fleet and moor our fleet of boats including the Fairfield University Sailing Stags. The total cost for this projected is estimate at $30,000.

Please take a look at photos on our Facebook Page of the pieces we hope to assemble to create this boat house to open May 1, 2012.

And help us raise the roof on our first floating boathouse by donating or becoming a member today!

Check out some other photos of the Floating Boathouse Concept

Taylor Walker, one of the founders of Team Chance shows a kid the ropes aboard a Big Boat. Walker hopes to show many kids the ropes this season aboard the newest addition to the CCB fleet "Stealth" a 26' Evelyn

Once approved we will continue to grow our fleet and will offer College and high school sailing opportunities for Fairfield University and with luck the public high schools of the Greater Bridgeport region. We believe this facility will grow the ever-increasing tide of high school sailing in our local waters and continue the fastest growing trend in local high school sports.

 This comes in conjunction with a project we are working on in Eastern Long Island Sound, Team Chance. Tayor Walker and Jay Greenfield, college students, set to work last summer to build a new program in the CCB fleet. Their idea was to provide low income children with a chance to experience big boat racing at the helm of a performance sail boat and mentor the kids as sailors and racers. This weekend, Team Chance launched their little girl, a 26’ Evelyn Sailboat called “Stealth” and are preparing to visit at least a half dozen community boating centers around the region to give the kids of community boating a chance see what it’s like race on a go-fast boat and try to raise funds to support youth sailing and community boating. Team Chance and the crew will sail into Bridgeport aboard Stealth later this summer and hope to provide some local sailors with a chance to win the Park City Regatta.

Laser Radial Sailors from area high schools start with a signal from the Pequod at Pequot Yacht Club this past Saturday for the annual regional sailing competition, The Fairfield Cup. Fairfield Prep, a continual supporter and great friend of CCB, ranked second out of fleet of ten teams who competed in 420's , lasers and laser radials. Congrats Prep on a strong showing and great season!This is a tack in a new direction for CCB. By intensifying our efforts to promote and participate in what we see as a growing trend for youth racing and sailing, a facet of sailing we have not previously delved into, we hope to further promote waterfront access for all. And with the huge growth this past spring in high school sailing in Fairfield County and the passions of our newest crewmates at Team Chance, we believe the waters of Connecticut have never looked better to provide every child with a chance to enjoy a day on the water. 

After weeks of being down, we decided it was time to renew the old look and work on a new one at the same time. You can see from the old content on this site that it has been down for sometime but we're back and ready to roll. 

Our plan to start a whole new season in a new location is on the rocks this weekend, but it's Mother's Day so make sure your Mom has a happy one and we'll have all the details on the new plan to bring CCB to Bridgeport Harbor (hopefully) by Monday

With your support, we provided over 750 children with their first chance to explore Long Island Sound and the sports of boating and sailing. 

What's more, we have now picked up more than 5000 bags of trash, restored a 40 year-old abandoned pier in a closed Landfill at Seaside Park and cleaned more than four tons of trash from the shores of Pleasure Beach and the Great Salt Marsh. 

We're all about protecting the children, families and natural resources in our community, Won't you please help us before the clock tolls 12 on New Year's Eve?

IN 2011, we plan to create a new floating facility in Bridgeport Harbor that will welcome thousands of folks back to the heart of the Park City and provide more than 1000 kids with a chance to enjoy the waters that sit just feet from their front doors. To get 1000 kids on the water, we need to raise $250,000 and to build a regional boathouse for all to use, we need to raise $1 million more.  So we need everyone's help and hope that when you contribute this holiday, you'll make CCB your cause for 2011 and ask your family friends to do the same. 

As a 501c3 organization, your contribution to CCB is fully tax deductible and you will see the benefit of your contribution when you visit the Park City, when we build our new boathouse in 2011- So please, dig deep and make a contribution that fits your budget online here today to help us build a brighter future for our community tomorrow. 

Many Thanks and Please have a Safe and Happy New Year in 2011-

P.S. We will be rolling out a new website Jan 1, changing our email service and changing our mailing address to 955 Connecticut Ave Suite 10012 Bridgeport, CT 06607- Please note this for your records and check out our new look for CCB on New Year's Day 2011.

The Eco Classroom proved to be a cozy igloo for Seaytee Cat who weathered the storm at the CCB Boat Ramp

Heavy snows have made roads into CCB impassable and will likely remain so until significant melting occurs. Please check back for updates as we dig out of this historic Christmas Blizzard and a very special thanks to Susie and Rich and the rest of rescue squad who braved bitter temperatures, icebergs and brutal winds to ensure th safety of the CCB fleet and our little girl. 

A holiday painting by Richard German- this was part of a four card set prepared for Red Farm Studio in 1994

the boats were all covered and the trailer was dark.

Buxton was nestled in the back of my car,

and the chickens were wintering at a home not too far.

Seaytee stood guard ‘gainst the mice and rats,

 while I dreamed of summer when I’d hope to see bats.

The year at our back was one of the best,

with kids by the hundreds,  but still could I rest?

To reach a few thousand, that was my goal  

and I knew that we could in the pit of my soul.

We have a great team, the brightest and best

and a fleet more than 50 with which we are blessed.

Our cause it is good, no child left ashore,

but how could we serve One Thousand more?

It came down to dollars and it came down to cents,

running a program is a great big expense.

And more was our station, in a former land fill.

How can you teach at the foot of a hill?

A hill made of garbage at the back of Seaside,

down a dirt road is where we did hide.

How could we tell the world what we did,

when our flame was kept under a municipal lid??

We needed a plan and we needed it fast.

Next year would be here,  as this one is past.

First to the team, lets call the clan,

 Now Alonzo, And Brooke and Schroeder and Joanne,

On Bridgeport, on Stratford, On Trumbull and Westport,

 Now Fairfield and Shelton and don’t forget Southport

Volunteers and Directors,  Family and Friends,

we need you all now to sail to the end.

The final chapter, it’s time, to bring it all home

to create a new boathouse for the kids of our zone.

A shiny new ship is just the thing,

to serve a few thousand  and make this program ring.

We’ll park it I think, next to downtown,

 in the harbor that’s blank and much of it brown.

Oh sure there’s a future for this spit of land,

 but plans seem far off and not quite at hand.

And besides we will float, where ever we can,

but here is the crux to the core of the plan:

It costs quite a bundle to purchase a ship

and to pay for a staff,  that’s smart as a whip.

To keep the boats painted, the sails in good order,

moneys the key,  from here to the border.

So please give of your dollars, please give your change,

Please become a member even though it seems strange

That you’d think to go sailing when it’s twenty below

In the middle of winter when the air’s full of snow

Cause while you’re aslumber this Christmas eve,

the folks at CCB are rolling their sleeves.

We’re getting to work, to serve every child,

the rich and the poor, the meek and the mild.

And before you can say Happy New year to one,

We’ll be working for all in the hot summer sun.

Do Good, Have Fun Sail Far-

Merry Christmas

The CCB Staff

A possible option for the floating facility we hope to create in 2011

But many do not know the full concept of what was envisioned for CCB on that rainy St. Patrick's Day morning in 2007 when I quit my job and Connecticut Community Boating, Inc. was founded. And as we close the books on 2010, it is with great hope and big plans that we prepare for 2011. 

In the coming year, I hope to finish the project I started by implementing the final phase for CCB- A floating Boathouse in Bridgeport Harbor. 

We've been kicking this idea around now for a few years and we have finally reached the point where it is time to bring it all together.  It's gonna take a lot of fundraising, a fleet of volunteers and a good healthy dose of public/private partnership. But now that even Stewie is taking pot shots at the Park City, it's time that we change the view from I-95 as we dot the Harbor with tiny little boats sailing in the shadow of a big ship at the Greater Bridgeport Regional Maritime Education Center!

For a full description of our ambitious goal to bring Connecticut and beyond back to the City by the Sea- Click here