by | Jul 18, 2020 9:56 pm | Comments (1)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Colaiacovo at the Council table in December.
Fixing fences is not in the job description of members of Hamden’s Legislative Council, but to Michael Colaiacovo, Jr., serving Hamden’s 7th District was not just about passing budgets. It also meant planting lengths of fence in a constituent’s yard on a scorching Saturday morning.
by | Jul 16, 2020 6:09 pm | Comments (4)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal at Stop & Shop.
On Wednesday, Charmaine Acampora got her first direct deposit paycheck from Stop & Shop since March without 10 percent tacked on as hazard pay. On Thursday afternoon, she stood in front of the Hamden Stop & Shop with U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal to call on the company to reinstate the hazard pay.
Continue reading ‘Blumenthal Pressures Stop & Shop To Reinstate Hazard Pay’
by | Jul 16, 2020 11:36 am | Comments (1)
Nora Grace-Flood Photo
The building at 20 Davis St.
In order to impose greater social distancing on campus, Hamden Hall will use its recently acquired property at 20 Davis St. to provide new classroom space for high school students come fall.
Almost exactly a year ago, on June 11, 2019, the Hamden Planning and Zoning Commission approved Hamden Hall’s application to convert the “castle-like structure,” which was built in 1906, and its surrounding open space from office use into an elementary school.
Continue reading ‘Castle Offers Short-Term Pandemic Solution For Hamden Hall’
by | Jul 15, 2020 7:46 pm | Comments (4)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Mayor Curt Leng, last year.
After a year of discussions and reports, the Hamden Employees Retirement Board voted Wednesday to reduce the monthly pension benefits of 620 retirees who were overcompensated because of a decades-long payroll error.
Continue reading ‘Hamden Reduces Pension Benefits For Overpaid Pensioners’
by | Jul 15, 2020 9:04 am | Comments (0)
Allison Hadley Photo
Chris Wuerth — bluegrass musician and purveyor of fine acoustic music at Best Video Film & Cultural Center in the Before Times under the guise of GuitarTown productions — strummed his guitar as a half-dozen or so musicians assembled around him. Plucking chords that felt as golden as the setting sun’s light on Monday, he grinned lightly as each musician showed up, also smiling. Though this particular session was the seventh time a select few musicians had gotten together to play as safely as they could, the first word to describe the atmosphere was ‘“reunion.”
by | Jul 14, 2020 4:46 pm | Comments (3)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Finance Director Curtis Eatman.
As Hamden prepares to issue two $16.5 million bond packages, rating agencies handed down their verdicts this week on the town’s financial situation with rating downgrades that place the town closer to the junk-bond cliff, but that could have been worse.
by | Jul 14, 2020 1:00 pm | Comments (4)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Weeks before a Democratic primary, State Senate candidate Justin Farmer cleared a hurdle with the approval of a state public-financing grant for his campaign, and got a boost from another endorsement.
by | Jul 13, 2020 9:53 am | Comments (1)
Sam Gurwitt File Photo
Council members Justin Farmer, Brad Macdowall, Kathleen Schomaker, and Mick McGarry.
The Hamden Legislative Council set the ball rolling to begin the process of updating the town’s charter, a long process that could change the way the town’s government is structured for the next ten years.
Continue reading ‘Hamden Seeks Volunteers For Charter Revision’
by | Jul 11, 2020 10:32 pm | Comments (57)
Ko Lyn Cheang photo
Andre Alexander outside DiBella’s with his forbidden mask.
Demonstrators converged on a Hamden sub shop Friday and the store closed early, after an employee was sent home for showing up in a face mask reading, “Black Lives Matter.”
by | Jul 9, 2020 4:00 pm | Comments (3)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Pension board attorney Marc Wallman.
Three weeks after Hamden’s retirement board heard a presentation from its actuary outlining its options for recouping $12 million in historical overpayments to pensioners, some of those retirees are banding together to protect their pensions.
by | Jul 9, 2020 10:39 am | Comments (5)
Opinion—Hamden is on the brink of bankruptcy, with insolvency so close that I can almost touch it.
Continue reading ‘Opinion: Who Is Really Responsible For Hamden’s Financial Disaster?’
by | Jul 8, 2020 4:16 pm | Comments (25)
With “remote” learning in-house in separate rooms, with paras.
by | Jul 8, 2020 1:56 pm | Comments (30)
Thomas Breen photo
Tony Alvarado, with his crab trap, by the Mill River Wednesday.
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Hole caused by sewer main collapse on Whitney Avenue.
Thanks to a corroded sewer pipe, millions of gallons of sewage flowed into the Mill River on Monday, and the Greater New Haven Water Pollution Control Authority (WPCA) had to scramble to stop the spill and reroute the sewer while it fixes a collapsed sewer main.
At a press conference Wednesday morning, New Haven officials urged people not to swim or fish in the Mill River or Lighthouse Point Park.
Continue reading ‘Sewer Break Pours 2M Gallons Of Sewage Into River; Swimming, Fishing Discouraged’
by | Jul 6, 2020 3:15 pm | Comments (3)
Quinnipiac President Judy Olian: Layoffs, expansion.
A week after Quinnipiac University professors sent a letter to university administrators decrying recent layoffs and demanding that the university rehire faculty and staff, the university appeared before the Hamden Inland Wetlands Commission to start the approval process for a new student wellness center it plans to build this fall.
by | Jul 3, 2020 5:27 pm | Comments (1)
Sam Gurwitt Photos
With the printed red flames from a fiery chicken wing visible on the glass storefront behind him, as if protruding from his head, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal delivered a message for the state’s small businesses: there are still federal dollars waiting to help them.
Continue reading ‘Blumenthal Plugs PPP For Black-Owned Businesses’
by | Jul 3, 2020 12:05 pm | Comments (1)
Sophie Sonnenfeld Photo
Barbara Redding.
Barbara Redding came in search of some fresh zucchini and eggplant and left with a handful of locally grown veggies.
Continue reading ‘Farmers Market Returns, Tailored To Pandemic’
by | Jul 2, 2020 3:25 pm | Comments (10)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
The Hamden Stop & Shop.
As Americans across the country this weekend celebrate 244 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence, Stop & Shop workers will mourn a different milestone: the end of their extra Covid-19 pay.
by | Jul 2, 2020 12:09 pm | Comments (3)
Sam Gurwitt photo
Chief Operating Officer Tom Ariola, pre-Covid.
As administrators scramble to figure out what school will look like in the fall, the Hamden Board of Education entered the 2020 – 2021 fiscal year with a host of uncertainties, and with about $2 million in cuts.
by | Jul 2, 2020 10:24 am | Comments (3)
A wild ride on State Street ended up with the killing of a person riding a scooter.
by | Jul 1, 2020 10:48 am | Comments (1)
Leigh Busby Photos
During the removal of the statue of Christopher Columbus in Wooster Square on June 24, there was a moment that crystallized what it was all about. As city workers secured the ropes around the statue to lift it off its pedestal, it occurred to a few in the crowd that it looked a lot like a lynching, and in that visual echo, they found some restitution.
Continue reading ‘Photographer Chronicles The City’s Upheaval’
by | Jun 30, 2020 1:15 pm | Comments (2)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Jorge Cabrera on the Stop & Shop picket line last year.
Citing his work as a union organizer, the Connecticut AFL-CIO has endorsed Jorge Cabrera’s bid for the 17th State Senate District seat.
by | Jun 29, 2020 3:00 pm | Comments (14)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Mayor Curt Leng at a recent protest.
Hamden’s Legislative Council approved a $25 million debt restructure to save $16.5 million over two years, to avoid an immediate cash-flow crisis.
If fiscal discipline doesn’t follow, said experts, it could be another band-aid that keeps the town’s fiscal wound infected without healing it.
by | Jun 26, 2020 12:37 pm | Comments (1)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Cappiello at a “unity walk” up Dixwell Avenue with members of a Hamden mosque at the beginning of June.
Updated 3:40 p.m. — After six months on the job, following over a year in an interim capacity, Hamden Police Chief John Cappiello will retire on Tuesday, capping over 36 years in the department.
by | Jun 24, 2020 4:32 pm | Comments (2)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
The playground at Hamden Plains Recreation Field.
On a normal Tuesday afternoon in June, there might be something other than browning grass, two lonely baseball diamonds, a hoop-less basketball court, and an empty bleacher on Pine Rock Field in Hamden.
by | Jun 24, 2020 1:50 pm | Comments (5)
Sam Gurwitt Photo
Council President Mick McGarry, Pre-Covid-19.
The Hamden Legislative Council voted unanimously Tuesday evening to override Mayor Curt Leng’s veto of its amended fiscal year 2020 – 2021 budget.
Continue reading ‘Hamden Council Overrides Mayor’s Budget Veto’