by | Apr 15, 2025 9:25 am | Comments (12)
Thomas Breen photos
Volunteers Tony Evans and Zelinda Clerk prep food for new Community Soup Kitchen outpost in the Hill.
As the Trump administration slashes federal food bank funding, local food access advocates are calling for New Haven to step in with nearly $1 million in city support.
by | Apr 9, 2025 9:12 am | Comments (19)
Laura Glesby Photo
Alder Marx (left): “I’m concerned about scooters continuing behaviors we’re already seeing: not stopping at red lights, using phones.”
The Veo scooter and the proposed parking sites, as outlined in a city presentation.
Now that streetside e‑bike rentals have rolled into New Haven, are e‑scooters next?
Alders on the City Services and Environmental Policy Committee weighed that question, as they advanced a proposal to allow 250 rent-per-ride electric scooters in downtown New Haven.
by | Apr 8, 2025 3:09 pm | Comments (0)
File photo
A 2021 vigil honoring Camryn "Mooka" Gayle at the corner now named after her.
“I told you, I told you,” cried Elizabeth Robinson. “I wasn’t gonna give up.”
She was talking to the memory of her 17-year-old daughter, Camryn “Mooka” Gayle, about the Newhallville intersection where Gayle died in a car crash in 2021.
Thanks to a Board of Alders vote Monday night, that intersection is now officially designated “Camryn’s Corner.”
by | Apr 8, 2025 8:36 am | Comments (21)
Thomas Breen photo
Pullen: First comes the letter, then comes the tax bill.
The Elicker administration is stepping up efforts to collect car taxes, by hiring a firm to help identify motor vehicles that aren’t — but should be — on the city’s tax rolls.
by | Apr 1, 2025 9:52 am | Comments (16)
Thomas Breen photo
1447 Chapel, home to a "cordial" rent-hike dispute.
A 75-year-old tenant’s monthly rent will increase by $100 — after the Fair Rent Commission chipped away at the landlord’s compromise proposal of $150, following an initial suggested hike of $350.
by | Mar 27, 2025 11:51 am | Comments (17)
Thomas Breen photo
Brewery Square: $24M renovation, 17-year tax break deal in the works.
A Fair Haven brewery-turned-apartment complex on the Quinnipiac River is on the brink of getting a new owner, a new tax break, and a new boost in affordable rentals.
by | Mar 27, 2025 9:45 am | Comments (27)
Abbey Kim Photo
Jorell Alford, Mell Savage, and other U-ACT organizers listen to Elicker's budget presentation.
Unhoused activists took their proposed “People’s Budget” directly to Mayor Justin Elicker Wednesday evening — bringing signs, printed copies of their proposal, tents, and calls for more money for homelessness services to the latest city budget town hall meeting.
Continue reading ‘U-ACT Confronts Mayor With "People's Budget"’
by | Mar 26, 2025 12:36 pm | Comments (0)
New women's locker room, coming to Ralph Walker.
With words of praise for “gender equality,” local land-use commissioners voted in support of a plan to build a locker room for Albertus Magnus College’s women’s hockey team that mirrors that of facilities already available to the school’s men’s hockey team, at a publicly owned ice rink in East Rock.
Continue reading ‘City Plan OK's Albertus Women's Hockey Locker Room’
by | Mar 25, 2025 2:00 pm | Comments (11)
Laura Glesby Photo
Skyy Merritt: "I'm really good at math" thanks to New Haven Counts.
These days, 10-year-old Skyy Merritt knows what’s going on in math class. That wasn’t always the case.
At a packed budget hearing in the Board of Alders chamber, Skyy watched her mom explain the reason for her academic progress: a tutoring program that’s been helping her with math and reading multiple times a week for the last year.
by | Mar 25, 2025 10:42 am | Comments (0)
Thomas Breen photos
Going up: The new Fair Haven Health clinic at Grand & James ...
... and the new Mequity self-storage site at 129 Amity.
Community healthcare and self-storage centers are on the rise on opposite sides of town.
Need to find them? Just follow the signs.
Continue reading ‘Signs Approved For New Clinic, Self-Storage’
by | Mar 24, 2025 5:01 pm | Comments (19)
Laura Glesby Photo
Mell Savage on being unhoused: "Their entire life is in their backpacks."
Nora Grace-Flood File Photo
More Pallet "Tiny Homes" proposed.
A coalition of unhoused activists marched into City Hall to meet the mayor’s proposed city budget with a spending plan of their own, as summarized by a song: “More housing, defund the police!”
by | Mar 20, 2025 4:26 pm | Comments (34)
Laura Glesby photo
Mayor Elicker (right): Trump’s administration is “illegally stymieing and setting up roadblocks to cut off funds that we’ve been legally awarded,”
New Haven has joined a second nationwide lawsuit against the Trump administration, this time over the city’s loss of access to tens of millions of dollars in already-allocated grants addressing climate change and clean energy.
by | Mar 20, 2025 2:10 pm | Comments (14)
Thomas Breen photo
Elicker (center): "We don't need any more of these shops."
Grand Asmoke Shop, time to local license up.
Mayor Justin Elicker put pen to paper at a City Hall signing ceremony that could lead to $1,000-a-day fines for rule-breaking smoke shops — as part of new local regulations governing where and how retailers can sell tobacco and vaping products in New Haven.
by | Mar 17, 2025 8:41 pm | Comments (23)
Thomas Breen file photo
Watch out, smoke shops: New rules on the books.
Laura Glesby Photo
Furlow (at mic): “This is one step towards a more healthy and vibrant city.”
New Haven officially has room for one last smoke shop — which will have to obtain a municipal license, alongside all of the city’s 212 existing tobacco retailers — thanks to new zoning and public health regulations passed by the Board of Alders.
by | Mar 13, 2025 3:16 pm | Comments (34)
Atticus expansion rendering, now rendered obsolete.
The Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA) unanimously rejected Atticus Market’s bid to build a second bathroom at its East Rock grocery and convenience store — citing concerns that the proposed 600-square-foot addition would be “incongruous with the neighborhood.”
by | Mar 11, 2025 3:51 pm | Comments (31)
Laura Glesby photo
Acting Assessor Pullen at Monday's Finance meeting.
More than 56 percent of real estate value throughout the city — or $10,132,855,885 in total — cannot be taxed this year.
Continue reading ‘56.79% Of City Real Estate Now Tax-Exempt’
by | Mar 11, 2025 2:25 pm | Comments (23)
Thomas Breen file photo
Compostables to be diverted -- on trash day?
The Elicker administration might build out a food scrap collection program as part of the city’s regular weekly trash pickups — if New Haven is successful in its application for a $3.3 million state grant.
by | Mar 7, 2025 8:12 pm | Comments (18)
Jordan Allyn file photo
Climate activists come to City Hall.
A dog, a baby, and several young climate activists went into City Hall. Their purpose was not to deliver a punchline, but rather a request for the city to take transportation seriously.
“DANGER TURN BACK TOXIC FUTURE” read a yellow road sign-esque poster. “DRIVE LIKE YOUR KIDS NEED TO SURVIVE HERE” read another.
Continue reading ‘Alders Pressed On "Transportation Transformation"’
by | Mar 7, 2025 4:07 pm | Comments (15)
Allan Appel Photo
Figlus, DeLauro, and Melnyk, among others, at Friday presser.
“The past few weeks have been among the most shameful in our nation’s history,” U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro said at a somber Friday press conference. “Trump is willing to sacrifice the freedom of an entire nation so that he can be seen as closing what is in his mind just another real estate deal.”
by | Mar 4, 2025 2:29 pm | Comments (6)
Crypto bros and gals, rejoice!
In a not-too-distant future, New Haveners will be able to pay their taxes via Family Dollar kiosks or instantly converted Bitcoin.
Continue reading ‘I'll Pay That Parking Ticket In ... Bitcoin?’
by | Mar 4, 2025 8:34 am | Comments (24)
Laura Glesby photo
Fair Haven Alder Sarah Miller quotes the Illinois governor on standing up to tyranny.
At a full Board of Alders meeting on Monday evening, Fair Haven Alder Sarah Miller made the case for courage in the face of a constitutional crisis, by way of some “divine guidance” from Illinois Governor JB Pritzker.
Continue reading ‘"Tyranny Requires Your Fear... Democracy Requires Your Courage"’
by | Feb 28, 2025 1:46 pm | Comments (35)
Thomas Breen photo
Elicker on budget day: Washington's crazy.
City of New Haven data
Proposed budget and mill rate changes.
With “tremendous uncertainty,” funding-freeze threats, and anticipated “draconian” cuts coming out of Washington, D.C., Mayor Justin Elicker proposed on Friday a “primarily status quo” city budget — which would see the general fund grow by 3.63 percent and the local tax rate rise by 2.3 percent.
Continue reading ‘Bracing For Trump Cuts, Elicker Proposes "Primarily Status Quo" $703.7M Budget’
by | Feb 27, 2025 11:28 am | Comments (11)
Maya McFadden File Photo
Reading reading reading, in a Barnard kindergarten class.
Two years after the school district switched over to a phonics-focused literacy curriculum, reading levels among New Haven’s youngest students are slowly but surely on the rise.
by | Feb 25, 2025 9:12 am | Comments (17)
Thomas Breen photo
No more Bigelow, hello "Bigelow Square"?
A vacant, contaminated waterfront industrial property in Fair Haven took a big step towards becoming a new 12,000 square-foot commercial/industrial building — thanks to a suite of City Plan Commission approvals for the redevelopment of the site of the now-demolished former Bigelow factory complex.
by | Feb 24, 2025 1:57 pm | Comments (12)
Abbey Kim file photo
Robert James (right) leads petition procession to the front office.
Elderly renters at a church-owned apartment complex on Goffe Street marched down their building’s hallway holding signs reading “Respect Seniors,” “Justice Matters,” and “Help Us Stay Safe.”
They then delivered a petition to the front office announcing their new status as a tenants union — and demanded a collective bargaining agreement.