ROCKY HILL, Conn. — Dozens of municipalities across Connecticut spent Monday catching up on distribution events, handing out thousands of COVID-19 testing kits to residents.
The kits are coming from a state shipment that arrived on Friday, bringing in 426,000 kits for all of Connecticut.
Rocky Hill held its distribution event at Elm Ridge Park at 9 a.m., finishing in just about an hour. Due to the high demand, traffic started backing up around 7 a.m., closing down Elm St. throughout most of the event.
"Everybody should have at least one test I think in their house in the event that they have to go somewhere," said Anne Alden of Rocky Hill, who was on location long before the event started.
Alden even made a morning out of it. She got out of her car and started walking around the park until the line moved
"You know why sit there in a car when I can walk," Alden said.
Thought the line wrapped around the park for more than an hour, the 1,500 testing kits went quick.
"We did about 625 in about 20 minutes, so they’re going very quickly," said Mayor Lisa Marotta of Rocky Hill.
The town just got their hands on the testing kits over the weekend and they spent all that time planning for this event. It’s something the emergency management director said takes a lot of work.
"As far as state coordinators, who’s doing what, when you can go to the distribution centers and pick up or when they’re going to be delivered, so there is a lot," said Stephen Pendl, Director of Emergency Management for Rocky Hill.
The town hopes to host another test kit distribution event soon. They do plan on doing a similar drive-thru to hand out N-95 masks this month. But they need more supply from the state and the federal government.
“We are hoping that there will be more testing kits coming out and absolutely we I'll keep the public informed as soon as we get that information," Marotta said.
For a list of other towns and cities handing out test kits, click here.
Julia LeBlanc is a reporter at FOX61 News. She can be reached at jleblanc@fox61.com Follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
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