Paul Bass Photo
Johnson at Ruoppolo; he’s being honored today for his work there.
Dealers and prostitutes were taking over apartments. The seniors were scared. Herb Johnson and Karla Miller decided they had to do something, working together.
It was last August. Johnson, a New Haven police sergeant, had just taken command of the Fair Haven district. Miller had begun work a year earlier as program director for the disabled and seniors living in the Ruoppolo Manor public-housing high-rise on Ferry Street.
Johnson was still getting the knack of the phone mail system when he received two calls from Miller. He went to see her at her office at the tower. She asked him to help her make the things safe and liveable again at Ruoppolo, which like many such public-housing complexes mixes elderly tenants with younger tenants termed “disabled” because of drug or alcohol or mental-health problems. At Ruoppolo, 79 percent of the tenants are non-disabled seniors.
“There was human feces in the hallway. There were needles, condoms in plan view. There were lights out,” recalled Miller, who oversees programs for tenants through a not-for-profit called The Connection Inc. Connection plans to give Johnson an award Wednesday afternoon at the Community Outreach Center for community service because of his work at Ruoppolo.
“Residents were intimidated and completely fearful,” Miller said. “They would cry and say, ‘I’m afraid to come out of my apartment in the middle of the day.’ I’d never seen anything like that. I didn’t know people lived liked that.”
Dealers would slip into the building and commandeer apartments of addicts. “They were feeding them crack, then taking over their apartment. [They’d say,] ‘I fed you crack last night, so I don’t have to leave.’”
For years tenants had begged the housing authority and the police for help.
At that first meeting, Johnson told Miller he was determined to help her make life safer at Ruoppolo.
Miller looked at him. People had told her stories about receiving such promises in the past. “Are you really going to be there?” she asked.
Johnson assured her. He also gave her his cell phone number. She took that as a good sign.
She took it as a better sign the following month when Johnson had arranged with the housing authority to station extra-duty cops at Ruoppolo and several other housing projects to be visible at key times and to collect information on troublemakers. The authority found money for a several-month campaign.
Miller was also pleased with the busload of Southern Connecticut State University students who pulled up to Ruoppolo on Sept. 11 It was a 9/11-related “day of caring.” Johnson arranged for the kids to help some cops and people at Ruoppolo clean up the grounds, including an outdoor courtyard. They painted the community room yellow. The day ended with a pizza party.
The idea, Johnson and Miller said, was both to make the place nicer, and to build “community” among tenants, cops, and the students.
“It was important to show them we’re here all working together,” Johnson said.
Johnson and Miller with case manager Christopher LaRose (center).
Johnson, who joined New Haven’s force 14 years ago, stayed in regular contact not just with Miller but with people at the housing authority. They made a list of people who weren’t to be allowed on the premises. Johnson checked on the three doors through which visitors can get into Ruoppolo: the front door, a back door, and most problematically, a laundry-room door. Two of the doors are in bad shape. The housing authority agreed to fix them, improve rear lighting, and create a safer handicapped-access drop-off out front in the process of undertaking a $2.5 million upgrade at the complex financed with federal stimulus dollars.
Meanwhile, Johnson got to work on the crime. His team of Fair Haven officers started finding out which apartments were the alleged sites of drug-dealing and prostitution. They found out which people were slipping in and causing trouble. They made some trespassing arrests.
They also got to know tenants. They encouraged them not to let troublemakers onto the premises and to share information.
Next they called in the police department’s narcotics unit.
“Herbie has his contacts in the community. They gave information to me. I also had a few complaints on it. I met with Herbie. His guys did a lot of the leg work and turned it over to us,” said the unit’s chief, Lt. Jeff Hoffman. Hoffman said his unit was able to obtain arrest and search warrants and make major busts in February at both Ruoppolo and nearby properties on Ferry and Poplar streets.
Tenants Wilbert Peterson (left) and Adam Salters.
“Things got better. We’ve got less traffic in here now,” reported Wilbert Peterson, who was hanging out with Adam Salters in the Ruoppolo lobby during a rainstorm Monday. “He [Johnson] has done a great job.” He and others greet Johnson with smiles and small talk about the complex, where the sergeant has become a familiar face.
The combination of the busts and the trust developed between tenants and cops has dramatically improved life at Ruoppolo, Miller agreed. “It’s still a challenge” with plenty of work remaining, including drug problems, she said. But progress continues, and she feels she has a partner in the police.
“This is how I feel about Fair Haven in general,” said Johnson, the 38-year-old son of a cop. The Fair Haven top-cop gig is a return engagement; he spent his first five years on patrol in the neighborhood before advancing to the detective division.
“There are some areas where it’s been the norm [to have flagrant crime]. They didn’t call it in anymore. We’re trying to break that,” he said. At places like Ruoppolo, his cops are working with neighbors to establish a new norm.
Read other installments in the Independent’s “Cop of the Week” series:
• Shafiq Abdussabur
• Lloyd Barrett
• Maneet Bhagtana
• Bitang
• Paul Bicki
• Scott Branfuhr
• Dennis Burgh
• Sydney Collier
• David Coppola
• Roy Davis
• Joe Dease
• Milton DeJesus
• Brian Donnelly
• Anthony Duff
• Bertram Etienne
• Paul Finch
• Jeffrey Fletcher
• Renee Forte
• Marco Francia
• William Gargone
• William Gargone & Mike Torre
• Derek Gartner
• Jon Haddad & Daniela Rodriguez
• Dan Hartnett
• Ray Hassett
• Robert Hayden
• Robin Higgins
• Ronnell Higgins
• William Hurley & Eddie Morrone
• Racheal Inconiglios
• Paul Kenney
• Hilda Kilpatrick
• Peter Krause
• Peter Krause (2)
• Amanda Leyda
• Anthony Maio
• Steve McMorris
• Juan Monzon
• Chris Perrone
• Stephanie Redding
• Tony Reyes
• Luis & David Rivera
• Luis Rivera (2)
• Salvador Rodriguez
• Brett Runlett
• David Runlett
• Marcus Tavares
• Martin Tchakirides
• Stephan Torquati
• Gene Trotman Jr.
• Kelly Turner
• Lars Vallin (& Xander)
• John Velleca
• Holly Wasilewski
• Alan Wenk
• Michael Wuchek