E. Richard “Dick” Fortunato and his wife, Grace, moved to Southington, CT in January 1995 after retiring from Seiko Corp of America, Mahwah, NJ, as Vice President of Marketing & Sales and General Manager of its Northeast Zone .
Fortunato attended Georgetown University and New York University, earning a B.S. (cum laude) in Economics and Marketing before going on to NYU Graduate School of Business Administration. He did  additional educational and research work at St. John’s University and Trinity College. For 17 years, Fortunato has been an energetic member of St. Dominic Church, serving six years in religious education, as teacher and Confirmation program coordinator; 15 years on the parish council, three as its president; and in 1997 was founding editor of the church newsletter, The Parish Pad. Fortunato is a developer and  director of the multi-media Parish Information & Communication Center. With former pastor, Rev. Henry C. Frascadore and other staff and lay leaders, Fortunato was an architect in the development of the vision of The Parish of the Future which brought together the principles of Stewardship, 21st century communications technology, an enhanced liturgy and the empowerment of the laity, inspiring a growth of 235% in parish membership and a 600% increase in volunteers serving 43 ministries and the construction of a state-of-the-art St. Dominic Community Learning Center in 2007 to advance the education, training and spiritual growth of the congregation and beyond.   In 1997, Fortunato's avocation for writing led him to the Southington Observer as a contributing writer. He later moved to the Southington Citizen, focusing his writing on the work in our community of people who volunteer their time with no other purpose than to help others. Fortunato served on the Board of Directors of Bread for Life and as its pubicity director for five years. He has been a  computer teacher at the Calendar House Computer Learning Center since 2000 and later served for 5 years on the Board of Directors of the Calendar House Membership Assn. and as its president for a year. He continues to be the senior center's publicity director while also assisting numerous Southington community service organizations.  Fortunato was the media and publicity coordinator of the  "Southignton Remembers 9/11" committee honoring the  10th anniversary of the attacks on America.  He produced a video of the events of the anniversary memorial which is now availalbe in DVD form at the Southington Public Library.  Grace and Dick Fortunato were awarded the St. Joseph Medal of the Archdiocese of Southington in 2011 for their long years of service in many areas of volunteer activity at St. Dominic Church and in the community. Fortunato believes in the extraordinary things that are accomplished by ordinary people who test the limits of human endeavor by going beyond them.