by | Nov 6, 2018 8:51 am | Comments (9)
Thomas Breen photos
Rosa DeLauro at Monday night’s get-out-the-vote rally.
Party stalwarts cheer DeLauro at Betsy Ross Parish House.
Dancing across the stage with her fist raised above a shock of purple-dyed hair, New Haven’s 75-year-old Congresswoman taught veteran and neophyte Connecticut Democrats alike how to send campaigners into the electoral battle of their lives.
by | Oct 31, 2018 2:45 pm | Comments (4)
Christopher Peak Photo
Nashelley, 9, demonstrates brushing technique at Hill Central’s clinic.
Tracey Oberg applied a mint-flavored fluoride to the surface of 9‑year-old Nashelley’s chompers, strengthening the hard enamel against the sticky layer of bacteria that causes tooth decay. She then swabbed a plastic protective sealant over the back molars. Nashelley said it tasted “kinda spicy.” Oberg sent the fourth-grader back to class in less than 20 minutes.
Compare that to average dental visit, which causes students to miss an estimated two hours of class.
by | Oct 31, 2018 7:39 am | Comments (3)
Markeshia Ricks Photos
City officials joined the owners of Patty’s Caribbean Cuisine …
… and International Tastebuds for a dual ribbon cutting on Congress Avenue.
The taste of the Caribbean has come to Congress Avenue thanks to three immigrants who’ve recently decided to put out shingled — right next door to each other.
by | Oct 25, 2018 1:26 pm | Comments (0)
Allan Appel Photo
Borneo lizard visits the Wilson Library.
Tarantula kissing was not allowed. Nor was rough petting. Or thinking mean or fearful thoughts.
by | Oct 24, 2018 3:00 pm | Comments (3)
Thomas Breen photo
New Haven’s chief state prosecutor David Strollo.
An experimental pre-arrest diversion program is off to a slow start in New Haven in part because the city already doesn’t put people in jail for low-level drug offenses.
Continue reading ‘Prosecutor Offers A Reason For Pilot Program’s Slow Start’
by | Oct 16, 2018 12:31 pm | Comments (7)
Sonya Schoenberger photo
The house on Button Street.
Sandra could hardly contain her excitement. The house was, in her estimation, perfect: beautiful, modern, and full of natural light. Best of all, she exclaimed, “Look at all the people it holds!”
by | Oct 10, 2018 12:29 pm | Comments (3)
Allan Appel Photo
Hill Alder Ron Hurt with APT skeptics Lynda Wilson and Dora Brown.
“You’re blowing smoke at us and expecting us to see clouds.”
“You’re talking first about your clients, and not about the neighborhood, of which APT is a part.”
Hill neighbors offered an evening of comments like those Tuesday night to an official from the APT Foundation.
by | Oct 9, 2018 6:04 pm | Comments (11)
Thomas Breen photo
485 Grand: Take a last look.
Commission Chair Pedro Soto, Nemerson embark on van tour.
Part of English Station is coming down. Half of Church Street South has been demolished. And barbeque is coming to Fair Haven’s new tech hub.
Those were some of the takeaways of a 45-minute van tour Tuesday focused on past, present, and future economic development projects in the center of the city.
by | Oct 5, 2018 7:48 am | Comments (1)
Christopher Peak Photo
Nearly 510 Clemente students took their classes to the streets Thursday, parading through the Hill to a nearby park.
by | Oct 3, 2018 1:40 pm | Comments (1)
Jillian Driscoll Photos
West Hills graffitied wall before and after.
The following was submitted by LCI Neighborhood Specialist Jillian Driscoll
Every fall, incoming freshman are expected to participate in a Day of Service at Southern Connecticut State University and this year about 200 fanned out over the city to make an impact.
by | Oct 2, 2018 8:10 am | Comments (9)
Christopher Peak Photo
Ace Amusements, center of organized retail crime ring.
For nearly a decade, a secondhand store owner in the Hill resold $6 million in stolen items brought to him by opioid users, sweating and sick from withdrawal. Now, he’ll spend the next six years of his life in federal prison.
by | Sep 27, 2018 3:45 pm | Comments (11)
Thomas Breen photo
Chief Alston checks in with deli cook Reuben during Thursday’s sweep.
Jim Turcio, surrounded by hens, in driveway of 58 Daggett.
In the trash-strewn backyard behind the Howard Mini Mart & Deli, Frank D’Amore found a collapsing chain link fence. The deputy director of the city’s anti-blight Livable City Initiative (LCI) also found an uncovered hole in the ground filled with empty milk crates. And piles of fallen branches and twigs. And two large tanks: one filled with grease, one filled with water.
All right next to a tattered mesh-screen doorway leading directly to the deli’s kitchen.
by | Sep 27, 2018 1:49 pm | Comments (8)
Allan Appel Photo
Unrepaired computers — some with pink Post-its quietly pleading “Windows has no sound” — were piled chest-high in the corner. Lights, microphones, and other recording equipment normally in regular use to produce the school news broadcast sat idle. Un-reshelved books filled up two carts.
Parents and teachers didn’t deliberately set up the room that way to make the case that they need their library and media specialist back full-time. But it didn’t hurt.
Continue reading ‘Daniels Parents Press Brass On Budget Cut’
by | Sep 24, 2018 2:48 pm | Comments (4)
Attorney Feinberg explains the parcel locations to commissioners.
Lucy Gellman File Photo
The former coops.
The former Hill Central Community Cooperative has a new owner and a new plan for revitalization that allows its current residents to remain in place and ultimately get new units.
by | Sep 24, 2018 8:09 am | Comments (9)
Thomas Breen photo
City Controller Daryl Jones (right) and city GIS Analyst Alfredo Herrera at Friday’s City Hall meeting.
Yale University plans on building out a new fiber optic internal communications network for its 500 facilities. Thanks to a new working relationship between the city and the university, the Harp administration sees the school’s infrastructure upgrades as an opportunity to learn best practices and achieve economies of scale for developing its own new fiber-based communication system sometime in the near future.
by | Sep 21, 2018 8:08 am | Comments (7)
Allan Appel Photo
Daniels parent Maria Flores at protest.
The John C. Daniels Inderdistrict Magnet School library has become a “ghost town.” The science fair, the school play, the book fair, and the student-made school bulletin are in jeaprody. The website is not being updated. Setting up and linking the teachers’ computers have also become difficult.
Meanwhile, the school’s longtime library media specialist, Patricia McGovern, the person who knows where to find the light switch in the auditorium and every room key, has been cut from full to half time. That has meant a loss of institutional memory in a school that has seen changing leadership over the last years.
Continue reading ‘Daniels Parents Plead With Birks On Staff Cuts’
by | Sep 20, 2018 11:55 am | Comments (7)
Pamela Kelley photo
A proposed new welcome sign for the Hill North neighborhood.
The new leaders of the Hill North management team is proud of their neighborhood. And with a rush of new development in the neighborhood in the works, they want visitors and residents alike to know exactly when and where they are stepping foot in the Hill.
Continue reading ‘“Welcome to The Hill North” Signs Pitched’
by | Sep 18, 2018 12:59 pm | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen Photo
Cutting the ribbon at The Learning Experience on Tuesday morning.
Matthew The Development Administrator (left) hanging with Bubbles the Elephant (center), the official mascot of The Learning Experience. At right: Lena Largie.
A former parking lot stranded between MLK Boulevard and Legion Avenue in the Hill is now home to a 10,000 square-foot childcare center that uses a cast of anthropomorphic animal characters to teach toddlers everything from vocabulary to etiquette to yoga.
by | Sep 17, 2018 8:09 am | Comments (3)
The city’s health department issued seven lead paint abatement orders in two weeks to six different landlords in the Hill, East Shore, the Annex, West River, and Fair Haven.
One of those abatement orders is for a Chapel Street apartment complex that the city has cited three times so far this year for three different units containing dangerously high levels of lead paint and housing child tenants with high levels of lead in their blood.
by | Sep 13, 2018 12:22 pm | Comments (13)
Hill area Alders Ron Hurt and Eveyln Rodriguez
Move the entire operation away from homes and schools deep into the heart of Yale’s medical district.
Fix the broken, under-funded Medicaid transportation system that’s supposed to serve those in recovery.
Have a private van service escort clients in and out.
Maybe even form a drug users’ union so they can have their own voice.
Operate in all of Connecticut’s 169 towns, and do it 24/7, if you must, but find ways to relieve the stress on an already deeply stressed Hill neighborhood.
by | Sep 6, 2018 8:00 am | Comments (2)
Brian Slattery Photo
Demolition at Church Street South.
Church Street South’s former tenants might have a basis to argue that landlord Northland Investment Co. acted unscrupulously in letting the complex fall apart, but they’d have a tougher time proving the developer acted negligently.
Superior Court Judge Linda Lager dropped those hints about how she’s weighing the merits of a class action lawsuit that would allow former tenants to argue their points collectively at one trial, rather than at hundreds of separate proceedings.
by | Aug 24, 2018 12:37 pm | Comments (52)
Thomas Breen Photo
New Hope kids traversing 1 Long Wharf’s parking lot.
Out on Howard Avenue, 3‑year-old Jameson Jones was vulnerable. A driver drove right into him. Sent him to the hospital. Could have killed him.
But according to the New Haven police interpretation of state law, Jones was not a “vulnerable user.” The driver, who admitted not watching the road, left the scene with a ticket for failing to grant the right of way to a pedestrian.
by | Aug 24, 2018 9:21 am | Comments (14)
Markeshia Ricks Photo
Seth Poole: “That’s less than it will cost to do the floors!”
Carly Wanna Photo
LCI’s board made a counter offer on this Grand Ave. building.
Plans to sell two city-owned properties changed after a board questioned whether New Haven government underprices the properties it sells.
Continue reading ‘LCI Pushed To Charge More To Sell Property’
by | Aug 24, 2018 7:43 am | Comments (7)
Ernest Willis at his Vernon St. home.
Ernest Willis looked across the street from his home of 30 years at two adjacent, vacant properties. Both had chipped facades. One had a gaping hole in its cellar.
“I hope they tear those down,” he said.
by | Aug 17, 2018 8:00 am | Comments (0)
Brian Slattery Photo
Demolition at Church Street South.
Church Street South’s former tenants can sue the executive in charge of the company that ran their apartments into the ground, but not the shell corporations hidden by another state’s laws.
Continue reading ‘Judge Spares Church Street South’s Shell Corporations’