Neighbors, Hill Health Strike A Deal

Hill neighbors struck a deal with a community health center executive to support a planned new addiction recovery center in exchange for the inclusion of a dedicated community meeting space.

That happened Tuesday night at a Livable City Initiative (LCI) Board of Directors meeting on the second floor of City Hall.

Commissioners voted unanimously in support of the city’s plans to sell two publicly-owned parcels at 649 and 659 Howard Ave. to Cornell Scott Hill Health Center for a combined sum of $125,000.

That proposed land deal, which now goes to the Board of Alders for a potential committee public hearing and final vote, would provide the local community health center with property it needs to build a new $20 million, 52-bed in-patient addiction recovery center on land it already owns at 232 – 236 Cedar St.

The vote took place only after half-a-dozen Hill residents, led by Sandra’s Next Generation co-owner Miguel Pittman, showed up at the meeting to voice their concerns. The called for a delay on a deal they said did not have the support of the host community.

After half an hour of public testimony and subsequent deliberation, the neighbors and Hill Health CEO Michael Taylor, with the help of city staff and the board chair, reached an accord with which both sides seemed content.

Pittman and his neighbors in attendance, including Dora Lee Brown, Hector Miranda, Calvin Counsel, and Hill North Management Team Chair Howard Boyd, agreed not to seek to delay the project as Hill Health seeks various city regulatory approvals.

In return, Taylor promised, in writing, that the new Recovery & Wellness Center will include a community meeting space to be made available to both the Hill North and the Hill South Community Management Teams for their monthly meetings.

“I trust Mr. Taylor will do what he has said,” Pittman said as the board added the community space condition to the proposed Land Disposition Agreement (LDA).

“You can count on it,” Taylor replied.

“Thank you, Mr. Taylor,” LCI Acquisition and Disposition Coordinator Evan Trachten said. ​“Thank you, Mr. Pittman. I think our board fully understands everything at play, and I think this is exactly how the process should work. I’m glad we have so many people here tonight, participating in the process.”

At the heart of the neighbors’ protest, as described by Pittman at the beginning of the board’s deliberations, were two primary concerns: that the community health center had started securing administrative approvals for this project without first coming to the community management team, and that that residents of that section of the Hill already struggle with frequent overdoses and public fighting related to the nearby APT Foundation methadone clinic.

Pittman held up a stack of papers which he said contained over 200 signatures from neighbors who oppose the Recovery & Wellness Center project.

“The community is concerned,” he said.

Pittman pointed out that the only community outreach the health center did before first going to the Board of Zoning Appeals in June was to get a letter of support from Ward 3 Alder Ron Hurt. That wasn’t enough, Pittman said.

He said Hurt provided that letter without first consulting the management team. Many neighbors only found out about the planned in-patient center, which will be a relocated and expanded version of the services that Hill Health currently provides on Grant Street, after the project had entered the regulatory process.

The City Plan Commission then tabled the proposed Howard Avenue land sale, he said, and advised the community health center to do more and better community engagement.

Which it did, Pittman acknowledged. He said Taylor participated in three different well-attended community meetings on the project. Even after those, he said, many residents still opposed the plans.

What are the grounds for the neighbors’ opposition? asked LCI Board Chair Tim Yolen.

“It seems like the Hill North and Hill South neighborhoods are a dumping ground when it comes to different programs,” Pittman said. The APT Foundation in particular, he said, presents a ​“major problem” with clients walking around the neighborhood ​“like zombies,” getting into sometimes lethal fights on Congress Avenue, and overdosing behind John C. Daniels School.

“It’s just horrible,” he said. ​“We don’t need anything like that in our neighborhood.”

“I just feel like this particular program here is being forced down our throats,” he continued.

Taylor, sitting between Berchem Moses Attorney Rolan Young and Hill Health Director of Purchasing & Facility Development Shawn Galligan, assured Pittman that this proposed center will be nothing like APT.

“The Cornell Scott Hill Health Center has existed in New Haven for 51 years,” he said. And the Grant Street addiction services center, which Hill Health plans to relocate to Cedar, has been around since 1990 ​“without incident,” he stressed.

“So while I greatly understand and appreciate the residents’ concern, the Cornell Scott Hill Health Center in all of its operations has always been a good neighbor in every community in which we have operations, without exception.”

Taylor said that the new Recovery & Wellness Center is planned for right next door to the current Southern Connecticut Rehabilitation Center (SCRC), which has existed for over 35 years without any community complaints.

“I think there is an unfair attribution of experiences,” he said, ​“because of another entity that has nothing to do with the Cornell Scott Hill Health Center at all.”

Ward 6 Alder Dolores Colon, who represents portions of the Hill and City Point, lives just two blocks away from SCRC. She said that the operation that Hill Health currently runs on Cedar Street ​“is like night and day” when compared to the sidewalk loitering outside APT.

Even though many neighbors remained opposed to the project, Pittman said, many also felt resigned to the idea that this addiction services center would be built regardless of whether the community protested or not. So, he said, he and Counsel and Boyd met for a lengthy discussion with Taylor on Monday to try to win some kind of community benefit from the proposed development.

After some miscommunication earlier on Tuesday about who was supposed to get in touch with whom first about the terms agreed to on Monday, Taylor presented a typed letter that LCI Executive Director Serena Neal-Sanjurjo read into the record.

“I understand that the Hill North and Hill South Community Management Teams seek space to conduct their monthly meetings,” Neal-Sanjurjo read from Taylor’s letter, ​“which we understand take place during evening hours. As a long-standing member of the Hill community, the Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center (CS-HHC) is pleased to offer meeting space for the Hill North and Hill South Community Management Teams within the proposed Recovery & Wellness Center, once construction is completed. Until then, CS-HHC is pleased to continue to offer Haven Court meeting space on a monthly basis at our main facility at 400 Columbus Avenue. Please provide us with your annual meeting schedule as soon as possible so we can notify appropriate personnel. Any changes tot he schedule will require 72 hours’ notice prior to the meeting date.”

That letter, Pittman said, adequately reflected what Taylor and the Hill North neighbors had agreed to the day before. And the compromise struck him as sufficient for him to withdraw his request for the board to table the item, so long as the final LDA included a condition that Hill Health stick to the community space commitment.

After the meeting, Pittman and Counsel said that they were willing to compromise in exchange for a new community space because the John C. Daniels school cafeteria, where the Hill North management team currently meets, is often locked when members arrive, and coordinating with the school to keep the space open after hours has proven to be a headache.

Plus, Counsel said, the team would like to forge a closer working relationship with Hill Health going forward. ​“They’ve got resources,” he said.