by | May 20, 2024 3:55 pm | Comments (27)
Paul Bass Photo
"Labor of love": Sculptor Marc Massaro with his finished product.
After a four-year journey, an Italian-American immigrant family landed in Wooster Square Park on Monday, pointing to both the past and the future.
by | May 6, 2024 12:47 pm | Comments (58)
Clockwise from top left: Up to 64 new apartments eyed for Hamilton St.; developer Yoon Lee; the 63 Hamilton parking lot; Lost in New Haven's Rob Greenberg.
A bid to provide lots more places for people to live on Hamilton Street has prompted pushback from some neighbors over where current and future residents and visitors will be able to put their cars.
by | Apr 29, 2024 12:57 pm | Comments (16)
Laura Glesby Photo
Nicole Davis and Patrick Li muse about a divided New Haven.
What should be preserved about today’s New Haven in 2034?
“I want the community feel back,” said Angela Hatley, who joined 60 other city residents to brainstorm visions for the city’s future alongside urban planners.
by | Apr 29, 2024 9:42 am | Comments (0)
"Addiction."
The arts and sciences, the movement and stillness, the rhythm of breath and step: on Saturday afternoon, all came together in the performance space at St. Paul and St. James Episcopal Church on Olive Street for Creative Circle, a delightful dance and music performance that saw two dance companies — the New Haven-based kamrDANCE and the New York-based SYREN Modern Dance — engage each other as well as the audience in their latest works in progress.
Continue reading ‘Creative Circle Asks Community To The Dance’
by | Apr 15, 2024 3:35 pm | Comments (49)
Wooster Lofts LLC rendering
64 apartments eyed for Hamilton lot: a new housing solution?
Thomas Breen file photo
Ben Trachten: IZ makes it EZer.
Because of one section of New Haven’s zoning code, this apartment building can’t be built.
Because of another section of New Haven’s zoning code, this apartment building might be built.
by | Apr 15, 2024 11:06 am | Comments (12)
Asher Joseph Photos
Yanis Bouchfira and Fabien Guedes ...
... at Sunday's 51st annual Wooster Sq. cherry blossom fest.
Cherry blossoms met pizza grease as French students Fabien Guedes and Yanis Bouchfira lunged to catch the falling petals in their paper plates.
Continue reading ‘French Students Chase Cherry Blossoms At 51st Fest’
by | Apr 1, 2024 9:17 am | Comments (29)
Thomas Breen file photo
20, 34 Fair St. (right): Recently sold, to be built up into 185 new apartments.
One of the city’s busiest builders has teamed up with a Wooster Square luxury apartment developer to bring 185 new rentals to Fair Street — now that the duo have acquired two service garages and a surface parking lot for $3.45 million.
by | Mar 15, 2024 3:36 pm | Comments (4)
Thomas Breen photo
Chloe (bottom right) with site director Michelle Reyes and teacher Lauren Safady at Friday's classroom reopening.
Wearing a unicorn-decorated shirt bearing the message “Kindness Is Pure Magic,” 3‑year-old Chloe danced through the ribbon-cutting for a reopened toddler classroom on Olive Street — as a leading childcare provider recovered from a pandemic-imposed setback.
by | Feb 1, 2024 5:26 pm | Comments (1)
Nora Grace-Flood file photo
City Health Director Maritza Bond Thursday at her department's new HQ: Wellness the new "holistic approach."
City officials cut the ribbon on a “health and wellness” center — and hoped the fresh color scheme and branding strategy could sell STI tests, school physicals and flu vaccinations to the public as presents rather than punishments.
by | Jan 12, 2024 9:00 am | Comments (9)
Wilbur Cross and Wooster Square are going electric — or, at least, readying to keep electric cars going.
Continue reading ‘24 EV Charging Stations Coming To Cross, Wooster Square’
by | Dec 19, 2023 1:14 pm | Comments (25)
Sam Gurwitt file photo
Derrick Draughn: "It's not about the money. I just choose not to pay it until I feel like it."
A highway-adjacent vacant lot on the northern edge of Wooster Square wasn’t sold at a foreclosure auction on Saturday.
It almost was. But for the third time in a decade, the property’s owner retained control after paying off years of back taxes just in time — and kept alive a dream of building on the site himself, or selling it to someone who will.
Continue reading ‘Empty Lot Owner Dodges Foreclosure. Again’
by | Dec 12, 2023 9:00 am | Comments (17)
Maya McFadden Photo
HSC students with English teacher Amy Brazauski.
A TikTok-focused English project for High School in the Community (HSC) sophomore Diana Robles brought her to the realization that “when I read a news article, I sort of just believe what it says.”
Now she thinks twice — about where the story was published, and about its credibility and potential bias.
by | Nov 27, 2023 8:20 am | Comments (15)
Allan Appel Photo
Time to call in the alders: City's Kathleen Krolak, sustainability intern Lewis Johnson III at the Ives CMT meeting.
Eating, drinking, shopping, and soon enough being ho-ho and merry are all roaring back post-Covid, which is good news for Downtown and Wooster Square and the city’s economy.
However, that also means parking woes and complaints from both merchants and residents are on the rise. And don’t forget about the dreaded 8,000-person bar crawl.
Continue reading ‘Happy Holidays! = Bar Crawls, Valet Crunch’
by | Nov 17, 2023 3:04 pm | Comments (5)
Thomas Breen photos
Luz Ayala (center) with friend Paula De La Cruz, and plenty of food ...
... at Friday's Thanksgiving giveaway at Loaves & Fishes.
Luz Ayala lifted up a frozen turkey wrapped in plastic and netting and talked through the culinary transformation that bird will go through on Thursday for Thanksgiving.
She’ll peel back the whole turkey’s skin and stuff it with a blended mix of green peppers, onions, olive oil, cilantro, and garlic. Then she’ll baste the bird in butter and pop it in the oven as she works on making a side of stuffing — also filled with meat, she said apologetically to this vegetarian reporter — for her visiting family members sitting down for dinner at her Columbus Avenue table.
She’s ready for that annual big cook. And, thanks to a bustling food pantry turkey giveaway in Wooster Square, she won’t have to worry about stretching her budget to buy the meal’s centerpiece.
Continue reading ‘700 Free Turkeys Fly At Food Pantry Giveaway’
by | Nov 9, 2023 4:25 pm | Comments (48)
A rendering of the new apartment building at 873-897 Grand.
Prospective builders of 112 new apartments have gotten the go-ahead to help fill a blighted stretch of western Grand Avenue — despite opposition from neighbors convinced that a six-story complex would wreck the corridor’s character rather than revitalize it.
Continue reading ‘Grand Ave. Housing Transformation Gets Green Light’
by | Nov 8, 2023 2:11 pm | Comments (18)
Thomas Breen photo
Rolling down Chapel Street towards the scrapyard.
Mike P. doesn’t remember exactly when he last voted. It was probably a decade ago, likely for President Barack Obama.
As he pushed a shopping cart full of bicycle wheels and mattress frames and long metal poles to a Chapel Street scrapyard, he reflected on what would convince him to return to the polls: a candidate committed to making “a very, very, very noticeable difference for the homeless community.”
by | Nov 3, 2023 8:57 am | Comments (9)
Abiba Biao photo
Tashi at work planting cherry blossoms in Wooster Sq.
Drenched in sweat, Tashi loaded up a wheelbarrow with nutrient-dense wood chips and mulch from a truck, ready to wheel it to his tree planting crew in Wooster Square. Although the work wasn’t glamorous or pretty, it would be worth it in the spring when the cherry tree’s blossoms come into bloom. Until then, the newly planted trees would have to rest and gain their energy under the autumn sun.
by | Nov 2, 2023 3:56 pm | Comments (61)
Laura Glesby Photo
Ellen Cupo and Andrea Zola debate.
Two Wooster Square residents running for alder convened for a debate — and sketched out diverging visions for policing, addiction treatment, and the legitimacy of the Republican Party.
by | Oct 20, 2023 5:17 pm | Comments (10)
Say Cheese...
... Gioia is open!
The long line outside Pepe’s pizzeria might soon extend across the street, now that Gioia — a new Italian restaurant, bar, gelateria, and market — has opened its doors at 150 Wooster St.
Continue reading ‘Gioia Spreads Tables And Joy For Grand Opening’
by | Oct 9, 2023 1:54 pm | Comments (32)
Thomas Breen photo
David Generoso by the ex-Columbus statue's plinth: "We think it was was something that was stolen from us unjustly."
A half-dozen members of a group called the Italian-American Defense League gathered in Wooster Square Park to celebrate Columbus Day — and to renew their call for a return of the long-gone statue depicting that federal holiday’s namesake.
The group charged with coming up with a new Italian heritage-celebrating sculpture for that same spot of Wooster Square Park, meanwhile, has now raised $320,000 out of its $400,000 goal.
Continue reading ‘Columbus Defenders Call For Statue's Return’
by | Sep 27, 2023 9:18 am | Comments (0)
Abiba Biao photos
Sophia Quinones, A’mya Foust, and Malaysia Bowden, coloring a “Conte Pride" poster.
At the Conte West back-to-school bash.
Seventh graders Malaysia Bowden, A’mya Foust, and Sophia Quinones were quick to agree that science was their favorite subject. Thanks to their teacher Mr. E, also known as Cecil Royal Estes III, they weren’t just learning about electrons at Conte West — but also about emotional regulation skills with his lessons, “Mindfulness with Mr. E.”
Continue reading ‘Back-To-School Bash Showcases Conte Pride’
by | Jul 31, 2023 9:12 am | Comments (8)
ASHER JOSEPH PHOTOS
A newly minted graduate accepts her diploma from Dixwell Alder Jeanette Morrison.
Forty-two high school seniors from eight different New Haven public high schools were celebrated for their accomplishments and perseverance after working through summer school to attain the credits needed to receive their diplomas.
Continue reading ‘42 High-Schoolers Reach Summer Graduation’
by | Jul 26, 2023 12:49 pm | Comments (34)
Thomas Breen photo
Tom Goldenberg, with Dave Agosta: "I believe that there is enough that holds together and that we share in common than what separates us."
Democratic mayoral challenger Tom Goldenberg will be listed on the Republican Party line on November’s general election ballot, now that he has accepted the local GOP’s endorsement for the city’s top elected office.
by | Jul 14, 2023 8:22 am | Comments (4)
Maya McFadden Photo
Rising third grader Machi codes a thunderstorm.
A digital thunderstorm rumbled into a Conte West School classroom of rising third graders who were in the middle of a computer-code-created camping trip.
by | Jul 10, 2023 1:35 pm | Comments (43)
Thomas Breen photo
Alder Cupo: "To know that there is a LGBTQ+-friendly affordable housing set of units [coming to] our city makes me believe that it is possible to win more."
Surrounded by elected officials and fellow Yale union organizers, Wooster Square Alder Ellen Cupo kicked off her reelection campaign by focusing on affordable housing initiatives the city has gained in the past few years — and the strip club her neighborhood pushed away.
Continue reading ‘Reelection Party Says Yes To Housing, No To Strip Clubs’