“It’s beautiful,” said Bruce Williams (pictured), standing in front of the Hill neighborhood apartment building he’ll soon call home. Williams, a once-homeless U.S. Air Force veteran, is one of 19 people moving into the Legion Woods Apartments on the corner of Legion Avenue and Auburn Street. The property, formerly two separate lots with apartments, a lively church and bar, has stood vacant for nearly 10 years. Now that a non-profit agency’s turning it into a home for disabled people, neighbors are happy to see an end to years of blight and loiterers.
The home is sponsored by the Connection Fund, Inc., a non-profit community development and human services agency based in Middletown. The agency has been working for six years to turn this vacant corner into a stable home, said John Robinson, the agency’s development director, addressing a crowd of 130 people at an open house ceremony Thursday afternoon.
With funds from the feds (U.S. department of Housing and Urban Development), the state (CT Department of Economic and Community Development) and the city (Livable City Initiative), the home is less than two weeks away from opening doors to tenants.
As mental health professionals, politicians and neighbors nibbled on chocolate-covered strawberries and strolled through the halls, Williams lead this reporter through a tour of his new home. He’s got his eye on three apartments — those with a bath tub — but he’s not being fussy. Each has big windows, a full kitchen and squeaky linoleum floors. Right now, he’s living in transitional housing at the VA Hospital in West Haven. Before that, he was homeless. “I’m just happy to have a place to call my own.”
Of the 19 apartments, 10 are set aside for vets. The VA Healthcare Systems, Columbus House, Inc., and Connecticut Mental Health Care Center are helping provide social services for tenants, said Pat Jackson of the property management agency, Community Housing Management, Inc. Tenants will have a live-in superintendent and pay only 30 percent of the rent — the rest is subsidized.
People familiar with Auburn Street, a one-block street in the North Hill neighborhood, see the new home as a welcome change. “It will be a turn for the better,” said one neighbor, Major Lloyd. The property has been used for “a lot of illegal dumping” over the last 10 years. The vacant house has attracted late-night cars and at times, drug activity. As part of contract with neighbors, the Connection Fund, Inc. put bright lights in the parking lot next to Lloyd’s house. With the lights, “it’s gotten better.”
Now one last hovel remains: That red house. It’s across the street from Legion Woods and has been vacant for 10, maybe 15 years, say neighbors. Clarice Cole, who grew up on the street and recalls the former Dunbar Cafe with fondness, said she’d be happy about that corner again “once that red house is out of the way.”
LCI chief Andrew Rizzo responded with good news: The lot, which the city owns, is up for sale as part of a four-house project to eliminate blight. The city put out a request for proposals and will be reviewing responses next week. All four, in the North Hill area, would be turned into owner-occupied housing. Houses would be ready to live in “in 18 to 24 months.”