(Abigail Roth sent in this write-up about a community project she and other volunteers undertook in West Rock and in the Hill this weekend. Chris Randall sent in the write-up following it about an Americorps community garden in Newhallville.)
The sidewalks near Yale-New Haven Hospital and near Katherine Brennan and Clarence Rogers schools were transformed on Saturday, May 14th. Kids from Solar Youth, Inc., Yale alumni and staff participating in the Yale Day of Service, Yale-New Haven Hospital employees, and city employees together painted the city’s “Street Smarts” logo and a community-created elm leaf design on area sidewalks. About 30 adults and children helped with the project.
Liberty Community Services held its third annual “Project STYLE” fashion event attended by 300 local fashionistas at the New Haven Lawn Club to support its efforts in helping New Haven’s homeless community living with HIV/AIDS and mental illness.
Students in the parking lot of the Episcopal Church of St. Paul & St. James.
More than 350 students at Southern Connecticut State University joined in “The Big Event” earlier this month, cleaning property, sidewalks, parks and streets all around the city.
Lending a helping hand has become an annual event for SCSU students, who are following in the footsteps of a quarter-century of service by their counterparts at Texas A&M University. What began there as a community clean-up has spread to more than 60 campuses around the nation.
Pastor Donald Morris and Eugene Brunson, chairman of the CCC.
Bullhorn in hand, Pastor Donald Morris led 15 other pastors on a march through the streets of Newhallville Saturday afternoon, despite the hard rains and high winds that stormed across New Haven. It was the latest effort of the Promise Land Project, a community outreach program aimed at stemming the tide of violence in the neighborhood.
The march began at the Dee Dee’s Dance School building on Dixwell Avenue and followed a route all the way to the front steps of Bassett School. Each member of the clergy used the bullhorn to broadcast a plea to the neighborhood to stop the violence and turn to God for salvation and guidance.
Edgewood student Arlo Bruckmann tests out the giant lollipops.
The Edgewood School play, “Willy Wonka Jr.,” delighted as ever, with kids in grades 3 – 8 acting, singing and dancing their hearts out. But if you took a closer look, you might have concluded that what goes on behind the scenes is almost as dramatic as the theatrical production itself.
Behind the production was a whole community of adults — not necessarily with a kid in the play, or even at the school — and professionals, lending their incredible talents to the production. And had you been there, either during intermission, or at the end of the play, you would have heard spectators speaking emphatically of their appreciation for the level of professional quality in the actors, their costumes and the stage sets.
Saturday saw the 127th installation of new officers for New Haven Elks Lodge #25, of the Benevolent & Protective Order of Elks (since 1884). The order is based at 524 State St.
The Cherry Blossom Festival has been a part of Wooster Square for 38 years. This celebration of spring commemorates the planting of 72 Yoshino Japanese cherry blossom trees in 1973 by the New Haven Historic Commission in cooperation with the New Haven Parks Department.
The festival has grown from a modest event with a local band entertaining a handful of neighbors under lighted trees to a major New Haven-wide event, drawing over 700 visitors last year.
On a recent Monday morning, Channelle Fuentes, a fifth-grader at St. Martin de Porres Academy, was afraid of dogs — “actually petrified,” said her school’s president, Allison Rivera. The following Friday afternoon, standing in a sunny parking lot in Southbury, she was calmly, even nonchalantly, stroking the head of a small black dog named Zipper.
“I learned not to be afraid,” said Channelle (at right in the picture above). “Sometimes dogs are scared because they were abused. Most dogs are really nice.”
“We cannot do it alone,” said New Haven Police Chief Frank Limon, referring to his police department’s ongoing efforts to reduce crime in Newhallville. “Only with the involvement of the community, the businesses, and the churches are we going to be able to stop crime – and equally important, sustain crime reduction.”
His comments came during a meeting of 75 Newhallville stakeholders who convened last Tuesday night to find ways to curb a disturbing wave of violence.
“Bourse” is French for “stock exchange,” but the image of harried, maniacal traders is the antithesis of what the owners of the new downtown business had in mind when they chose the moniker.
“The Bourse,” said New Haven architect and co-business owner Robert Orr, “was inspired by the early days of the Paris Stock Exchange; a place where people could find support as well as funding, and most importantly, a place where new ideas could be exchanged and find footing.”
Though it remained hard to see over the mounds of snow lining my street, speculation about the about the big green creature sprawled across my Westville lawn was not in short supply. Is it a dragon, a dinosaur? How was it painted?
A small boy with his sister and mother gave a thumbs up as he authoritatively asserted, “It’s a Stegosaurus.” Period.
Another passerby said she was happy to see that “it’s a vegetarian” after spying sprigs of pachysandra dangling from the creature’s mouth.
“She was one of those quiet heroes that we have all across America. They’re not famous. Their names are not in newspapers, but each and every day they work hard. They aren’t seeking the limelight. All they try to do is just do the right thing.” —President Obama remembering grandmother Madelyn Dunham.
At 6:30 a.m., I’m shoveling the mound of snow pushed in front of my driveway so I can go meet Herb Turner. “There is no way this guy is going to be there,” I thought to myself. “We just got 20 inches, the streets are barely passable, it’s 20 degrees out, and he’s 79 years old!”
Left to right: Kim Coppola, Pres. St. Bernadette’s School, Principal Sherry Steines, St. Bernadette’s School, Me presenting the check to the Principal (Susan Campion, Co-treasurer “Democrats for a New Vision”, Nick Colavolpe, Co-Treasurer of PAC presenting check to Lucia Paolella, Principal Nathan Hale School, Rosa Rodriguez, Acting Pres. Nathan Hale School, and Father Carter, Pastor of Saint Bernadette’s parish. Not in the picture but
present, Sal DeCola, Vice- Pres. School and Church Council, St. Bernadette’s parish.
East Shore Democrat Susan Campion sent in this write-up about the final charitable donation of her Political Action Committee.
The “Democrats for a New Vision” PAC’s co-treasurers’ Susan Campion and Nick Colavolpe today announced a new community enrichment action sponsored by the PAC. To celebrate 2011, the PAC dispersed its remaining funds with $500 contributions to the Nathan Hale PTO and the Saint Bernadette PTO on Monday, Jan. 10 at Nathan Hale School.
Susan Debarcher and Moira Cotlier-Cassell sent these snow-tos of Morris Cove in this weekend’s storm. Cotlier-Cassell’s are specifically of Black Rock Fort. Michelle Reynard sent pics from East Rock; Cedar Hill Resident offered an indoor view of her “fun” in the snow. Phyllis Gamm was on the Green. (Send us your photos of the storm .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address); click here to see readers’ photos from the last one.)
Independent reader Rebecca Turcio, aka Cedar Hill Resident, sent in this opinion piece about a recent encounter with a hard-to-see pedestrian.
New Haven is on the road to becoming more pedestrian friendly. I love the bike lanes and pedestrian signs in the road. I love seeing traffic moving slower in our communities. But most of all I love to see the proactive involvement of communities. More people on bikes and on foot only benefit this city and its businesses.
Paula Panzarella sent in the following report. She and John Fitzpatrick contributed the photos.
Saturday, Dec. 18, the annual West River Holiday Party, sponsored by the West River Neighborhood Services Corporation, was held at Berger Apartments, 135 Derby Ave. There were about 250 adults and children converging in the community room and solarium for crafts, face-painting, food, music and free toys.
Pedro Galarza, Facilities Maintenance student, and Kyterrua Wells, C.N.A. student, helping out at the Hartford Armory.
Jacqueline Solimini of the New Haven Job Corps Center sent in this write-up about a recent toy collection effort.
As part of Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s task force and holiday initiative, New Haven Job Corps Center (NHJCC) students and staff partnered with the staff of of the state Department of Labor (DOL) to collect toys for Operation ELF (an acronym for Embracing Lonely Families). The purpose of the drive is to distribute toys statewide to the families of deployed service people. On Tuesday, two students, Kyterrua Wells, C.N.A., and Pedro Galarza, Facilities Maintenance, delivered hundreds of donated toys collected under this partnership to the Hartford Armory. We were granted special clearance and special passes from Gov.Rell to drive the toys inside the upper level of the Armory — over hardwood floors — and then to tour the Armory and visit with personnel.
Author and editor Anne Witkavitch, a former Westville resident who still has family ties to the area and currently lives in Bethany, will be reading selections from her recently published anthology, “Press Pause Moments: Essays about Life Transitions by Women Writers“Pya and other holiday-themed works at Deja Brew Café, 763 Edgewood Ave., on Sunday, Dec. 19, from 12 to 3 p.m.
Parent Chaperones and 2nd graders from Ezra Academy get ready to fill their shopping
carts with groceries for the JFS Food Pantry.
Harriet Friedman sent in this write-up and these photos about recent food-drive activity benefiting the Jewish Family Services food pantry on Whalley Ave.
At 8:30 am Tuesday morning, 24 second-graders from Ezra Academy, eight parent chaperones and two teachers descended upon New Haven’s Stop and Shop supermarket with $800 to spend and only 45 minutes in which to fill their shopping carts.
Win Davis, operations manager, and volunteer Sarah Welch among the 100s of wreaths they put up.
The weather the day before Thanksgiving was far from frightful and was actually so delightful that the Town Green Special Services District took advantage of it to hang the traditional downtown Holiday wreaths.
Officer Shafiq Abdussabur (left) and Asst. Chief Thomas Wheeler
Removing violence from our community was the theme of last weekend’s fifth annual Brotherhood Leadership Summit, held at The Newhallville Community Center on Dixwell Avenue in New Haven. The Brotherhood Leadership Program is organized by the Christian Community Commission (CCC) under the direction of Executive Director Minister Donald Morris. The CCC is a Newhallville-based outreach organization comprised primarily of pastors and other community leaders from area congregations. CCC programs include youth mentoring, family counseling and fatherhood ministries.
The longstanding Wooster Square business Studio 607, a full service hair and skin salon, is moving three blocks west to 839 Chapel St. – into the English Building. As part of the change owners Thomas and Sami Angelini will also give it a new name, Salon Lulu, which was inspired by their daughter Luciana – also known as “Lulu.” (She’s shown here with her father Thom getting the first clip.)
Pictured left to right: Gordon and Shelley Geballe, Louise Endel, Che Dawson, Erik Clemons (Executive Director), Rita Berkson (Chair of Board of Directors).
Lisa Scrofani of local non-profit Leadership, Education, and Athletics in Partnership (LEAP) sent in this photo and write-up about a recent awards ceremony held by the organization. The group honored several “LEAPers of Distinction”: Louise Endel, Gordan & Shelley Geballe, and Che Dawson.
