Vineyard Vines by Mitchells has opened at 90 Main St. in Westport. The official grand opening is scheduled for Saturday at noon. The upscale clothing store replaces Talbots Mens. (See WestportNow Feb. 11, 2008) The store is another joint venture by the Mitchell family of Westport and brothers Ian and Shep Murray of Greenwich, who founded their company in 1998. The two families opened a Vineyard Vines by Richards in Greenwich in 2006 and more recently one in Key Largo, Fla. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Dave Matlow for WestportNow.com

The Westport Weston Chamber of Commerce has announced the appointment of Lance Herman as its new executive director.
Lance Herman began hospitality career in 1984. WN file photo/Dave Matlow

Herman, formerly general manager of the Westport Inn on Post Road East, has been working on a consulting basis since the beginning of the year.

“We are excited that Lance will be joining the chamber in this role,” said Richard Gordon, chairman of the board of directors.

“His experience in our town and his vision of the chamber will serve the organization well. The future for the chamber and its member businesses is a bright one and we look forward to Lance’s stewardship.”

Two well known Westport automobile dealerships on Post Road East long owned by the Crabtree family—Toyota of Westport and Lexus of Westport—have changed hands.

The buyer was Michael J. Cantanucci of the New Country Motor Car Group of Saratoga Springs, N.Y., which operates Lexus, Mercedes-Benz, Maserati, Ferrari, BMW, Porsche and Audi luxury automobile dealerships in Connecticut, New York and Florida.

The real estate portion of the Lexus dealership at 1317 Post Road East, comprised of 0.73 acres sold for $4 million and the land occupied by the Toyota dealership at 777 Post Road East comprised of 2.14 acres sold for $6 million, according to filings in the Town Clerk’s Office.

The sale price of the businesses was not disclosed although documents filed with the Town Clerk’s Office showed that financing of up to $362.8 million was extended to New Country as part of the transaction.

Wake, See, Dimes, Bryniczka & Bloom, one of Westport’s oldest law firms, has joined with Milford’s Berchem, Moses & Devlin, P.C., resulting in a staff of almost 30 attorneys covering 14 different law specialties. The new firm will continue to operate at 27 Imperial Ave. in Westport, as well as 75 Broad St. in Milford. Areas of practice in the combined firm include business and commercial law, labor and employment, civil litigation, land use, estate planning, and real estate law.  Members of the combined firm posed for a picture outside of their Westport office. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Contributed photo

Hudson Valley Bank, the largest independently owned commercial bank headquartered in Westchester County with $2 billion in assets, announced today it plans to open three additional branches in Fairfield County, including one in Westport.
The future home of a new branch of Hudson Valley Bank at 420 Post Road West in Westport. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Dave Matlow for WestportNow.com

The Westport branch will be located at 420 Post Road West, formerly home of a TD Banknorth branch, and will be open in the latter half of this year, an announcement said. The other new branches will be in Fairfield and Greenwich.

Hudson Valley, headquartered in Yonkers, N.Y., serves the metropolitan area with 25 branches located in Westchester, Rockland, the Bronx, Manhattan and Queens, N.Y., as well as in Fairfield County. The bank opened its first full service branch in Connecticut in Stamford in December 2007.

“Our goal is to serve the deposit, lending and investment needs of individuals, businesses, professional service firms and not-for-profit organizations in Fairfield County,” said James J. Landy, president and chief executive officer.

A Westport man who is a former president of Greenwich-based United Rentals Inc. was arraigned today on insider trading and securities fraud charges in federal court in New Haven.
John N. Milne: Westporter denies allegations. File photo

John N. Milne, 48, a Canadian citizen living on Maple Avenue South in Westport, used insider information when he sold 850,000 shares of United Rentals stock and made more than $2 million, according to federal prosecutors.

They also said he deceived investors and filed bogus documents with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to inflate the company’s stock price and personally benefit in an alleged conspiracy from 2000 to 2005.

Milne was arraigned in front of U.S. Magistrate Judge Joan G. Margolis and was released on $1 million bond and ordered to surrender his passport, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said. He was indicted Thursday on an eight-count indictment by a federal grand jury.

Today marks the fifth anniversary of WestportNow.com, one of the pioneering local news Web sites in the United States.

From a small audience of several hundred a month when it first began, WestportNow currently attracts between 30,000 and 40,000 “unique” visitors a month and generates about 200,000 page views, according to independent Web traffic monitors.

The surge in readership is consistent with the results of a just released Zogby poll which found a continuing shift away from traditional sources of news, such as newspapers and TV, to the Internet, most dramatically among so-called digital natives,  people under 30 years old.

Advertisers who want to reach this growing and highly engaged readership are encouraged to direct inquiries to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).