TORRINGTON – Torrington Mayor Mike Varney has served the city in many roles for more than 40 years, including city councilman and mayor – and now a street in the city will bear his name. 

The Torrington City Council passed a resolution Tuesday night to rename Industrial Park Road, which spurs off the overpass and runs to Highway 26, to Varney Boulevard in honor of the long-time public servant who will be retiring in January. 

Varney said he never imagined he would receive such an honor. 

“It’s a great feeling,” he said. “I didn’t even know about it until they brought it up in that first meeting. I didn’t know what was going on, so it was just kind of a shot out of the blue. The more I thought about it, I just thought it was great. I would have never, ever thought of that. 

“I’m really appreciative of it. It’s neat to have that. I never even thought about it. I never thought about any of that when I was mayor or a councilman. When they did that the first night I thought that was a neat honor.”

Councilman and mayor-elect Randy Adams said he has known Varney for more than 40 years. He believes Varney deserves the recognition. 

“He’s meant a lot to this town,” Adams said. “There have been a lot of improvements people might not be aware of.”

Adams said the idea of renaming a street in Varney’s honor started with Councilman Dennis Kelly. When the rest of the council heard the idea, the only debate was what to call the street. 

“That actually came from Dennis. He brought that to the rest of us and we talked about it. There was obviously no opposition to it. The only problem was figuring out if it was going to be a street, a boulevard, a road – we didn’t know.”

The council and other city officials hosted a short ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday, followed by a reception at City Hall. Varney said it was a special day and an honor for him. 

“It was fantastic,” he said.