Heights Hopefuls Target Housing, Speeding

Speeding, speeding, speeding tops the agenda of the Democratic challenger vying to be the next Fair Haven Heights alder, while the ward’s incumbent has her sights set on boosting affordable housing for homeless youth and on fixing broken sidewalks and paving cracked streets.

Those were the top issues brought up by the two candidates running to represent the 3th Ward on the Board of Alders next year during two separate interviews with the New Haven Independent.

Incumbent Alder Rosa Ferraro Santana, who is running for her fourth consecutive term and her eighth term on the board in total (she served four terms, lost her seat, and then was reelected in 2013), said after this week’s Board of Alders meeting that her priorities include expanding affordable housing and maintaining a vibrant, safe neighborhood near the Quinnipiac River in the Heights.

Her challenger, Raymond Wallace, promised to focus on addressing neighbors’ concerns with fast-moving cars. Canvassing the ward on Tuesday, Wallace heard time and time again about speeding on Quinnipiac Avenue. Speeding on Lexington. Speeding up and down the steep hill of East Grand. Parked cars smashed up, totaled. Endangered pedestrians, bicyclists, and kids playing on the sidewalks. The need for more speed bumps, and humps.

Santana and Wallace, who is running his first-ever political campaign, face off in a Democratic primary this coming Tuesday. Santana won the Democratic Town Committee’s endorsement at a July convention.

Streets, Sidewalks & Affordability

“I love my community and I want to do as much as I can for my community,” Santana said in an interview.

Asked to list her proudest accomplishments, she cited updates to the Grand Avenue Bridge, Quinnipiac Avenue, and Benjamin Jepson School. She spoke of her time leading the city’s Youth Commission and helping to introduce a Politics 101 course in city high schools.

“The big issues are streets and sidewalks in my community,” she said, ​“and a vibrant community where we can all live peacefully together.”

As for citywide concerns, she said, affordable housing tops the list. As the chair of the aldermanic Legislation Committee, she helped create the new permanent Affordable Housing Commission, following up on the recommendations of the Affordable Housing Task Force.

“That to me is critical,” she said. ​“I want to see youth that have been displaced, who live on the streets, find a place where they can stay in a safe place. That has always been my thing, for 20 years.”

Santana said she works in the banking industry in New Haven, where she specializes in business loans. (Company policy prohibits her from discussing the bank in her political work.)

Speed Humps? Bumps?

Twelve years ago, Raymond Wallace founded Guns Down Books Up, a youth anti-violence group that gets young men on the path of responsibility through community service.

Hegamely made the connection between the kid-calming and traffic-calming on Tuesday as he talked to concerned older residents like Leroy Reddick, longtime home owners Amoy Kong-Brown and Phil Brown, and attendees at a Quinnipiac East Management Team meeting at St. Joseph’s Church on East Grand Avenue.

Wallace’s day job is as a mentor specialist with the Post Traumatic Stress Center on Edwards Street. Through that group he has founded a male mentoring program called the Young Kings Brotherhood. It does work similar to Guns Down Books Up, except the sessions, which include social skills and how to interview for jobs, are formally conducted at Hillhouse, Cross, and four other high schools.

He and his kids and supporters over the years have held unity festivals, including school supplies give-aways and picnics, in city parks, and regular monthly clean-ups around the Lancraft/Warwick/Farren section in the Annex and Heights.

He said he dreams of buying a falling-down Heights house and gut rehab it through sweat-equity of kids and neighbors into a safe youth center.

He told all that to Reddick, who took it in, in a positive way, but then returned to his chief concern: ​“What gets me is the speeding.”

“Maybe we need bigger bumps?” said Wallace.

“They get like they’re in the woods up here,” said Reddick. ​“There’s no law, it’s reckless, and the kids play in the streets.”

Wallace shared that he lives on Warwick Street nearby, where the speeding is also a problem. At least five people he’d spoken to that day prioritized speeding and reported that careening drivers have swiped or wrecked their vehicles.

“If I wasn’t for real, I wouldn’t be wasting your time. This is my passion,” said the candidate.

As the two men were talking beneath a large-canopied tree on Lexington Avenue, a police car turned quietly in and drove by.

Nodding toward the cruiser Reddick said, ​“You see this once in a blue moon.”

“Have you reached out to your alderman?” Wallace asked.

“I don’t even know who it is.”

“That’s what I hear all the time. I don’t want to be that kind of politician.”

Moments later, farther south on Lexington, Wallace met longtime homeowners Amoy Kong-Brown and Phil Brown. He made the same case: It is time for neighbors like him and others in the area to become more active players in addressing youth and traffic calming. ​“I want to be among the people who want to make change,” he said.

The Browns listened to Wallace’s pitch. They said that speed bumps the city put on Lexington Avenue are not placed in the right locations. More needs to be done. Maybe humps, not bumps, said Amoy Kong-Brown.

“We can do it, but I can’t do it by myself,” said Wallace. ​“We have a meeting on bumps, but you’ve got to attend.”

Amoy Kong-Brown, who said she had not seen any of Wallace’s signs or read his campaign literature, asked how he is conducting his campaign.

“I believe in door-to-door. Some older people don’t use the internet,” he replied.

“I’m bringing the Young Kings Brotherhood this weekend,” Wallace said, and the kids will help him canvas the neighborhood.

Kong-Brown pointed to the blue sky above her house on Lexington and brought up Tweed-New Haven Airport: ​“I have no problem with an airport, but the planes seem very low. They need to stick to their flight paths.”

She said if more planes come and if flight paths change, then the acoustic upgrades that the city has performed on houses in Morris Cove, closer to the airport, should be available to residents of Fair Haven Heights.

It appeared Wallace didn’t have a position on that particular issue. Like the youth worker and community organizer he is, he listened and nodded his head.

“Even if it doesn’t work out this time,” said Kong-Brown, ​“you’re stronger the next time.”

“Come out and vote for me. For change,” Wallace said as he shook their hands and moved down Lexington.

Wallace, who will not be running in November should he lose the primary, said he and his group of kids and supporters are committed to continuing their work in the Heights: ​“Win or lose, we’re still going to fight to uplift our community.”