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Attorney Ricketts: Aldermen have the “sole authority.”
Morrison: Yale has plenty of “potato chips.”
Aldermen put off a showdown with Yale over High and Wall streets — handing the matter over to a new crop of Yale-union-affiliated incoming lawmakers who may to try to force the university to pony up more cash.
Several of those aldermen were literally waiting in the wings Wednesday evening as the Board of Aldermen’s City Services and Environmental Policy Committee considered a 20-year-old agreement between the city and Yale over the closure of two city streets in the heart of Yale’s campus.
It was the latest hand dealt in an ongoing game of high-stakes poker between Yale and aldermen who are considering trying to renegotiate the 1990 agreement.
One alderwoman who takes office next month, Dixwell’s Jeanette Morrison, said she plans to push for Yale to contribute more money to New Haven as a condition of the the streets’ continued closure. “We need help,” and Yale can afford to give more
As a result of the original 1990 deal, Yale took over High Street and made it a central flagstone-paved component of its campus. Wall Street is technically closed to traffic but still widely used as a pass-through.
As part of a broader deal at the time, Yale gave the city $1.1 million and agreed to yearly voluntary payments for fire services, the addition of the Yale golf course to the Grand List, and an investment of $50 million over 10 years in economic development.
The agreement called for a review after 20 years. The nature of that review is a matter of some dispute. Yale’s position is that the review was intended to be only an examination of the workability of the arrangement in terms of traffic, not finances. Some aldermen see it as an opportunity to perhaps renegotiate the terms of the agreement and secure more money from Yale.
Lauren Zucker, Yale’s director of New Haven affairs, has said that the university is not willing to pay any more money to keep the streets closed. In fact, opening up the agreement for renegotiation might cause Yale to reconsider some of its other contributions to the city, she has said.
Aldermen now have to decide whether or not to call the question: Just how much are the streets worth to Yale?
With Wednesday night’s meeting ending with an inconclusive tabling of the matter, a decision on whether or not to renegotiate will not happen before Jan. 1. On that date 19 new aldermen are sworn in. The majority of those ran for office on a slate crafted by organizers from UNITE HERE Locals 34 and 35, two Yale-employee unions often critical of the university. (Read about that here and here.)
Several of those aldermen-elect showed up Wednesday night to listen in — Westville’s Adam Marchand, Yale senior Sarah Eidelson, Dixwell’s Jeanette Morrison, and West River’s Tyisha Walker. Doug Hausladen, downtown’s alderman-elect, was also on hand.
Attorney Dickins.
They listened as Hartford attorneys Oliver Dickins and Robert Ricketts presented a legal opinion they wrote in response to a committee request to parse the 1990 agreement. They concluded that the deal was lacking in detail and contained vague language.
“I would not have been comfortable with my client signing this agreement,” Ricketts said.
What is clear is that aldermen have unquestioned control over city streets and can renegotiate the deal if they wish, the lawyers concluded.
The “contract” was for 20 years, Dickins said. “Now that time has run.”
Yale’s Michael Morand, who was on the Board of Aldermen in 1990 and voted on the agreement, later said that’s a mischaracterization of the agreement. It was not a “lease” or an agreement with a defined term, he said. The only question intended to remain open is whether the arrangement works from a traffic perspective, which a city study answered in the affirmative, Morand claimed.
Ricketts said the board should decide first what it wants, then any new agreement — if there is one — should be very detailed.
Further discussion of what “good faith” bargaining entails, given certain hypothetical situations, ensued. Aldermen cut the conversation short to avoid tipping their hand.
Committee members voted to table the matter pending further discussion of what the next step will be.
Aldermen Dildine and Elicker.
East Rock Alderman Justin Elicker, the committee chair, said there is “aboslutely” no way the matter will be resolved by Jan. 1.
He said he took away two things from the meeting. First, “The current agreement’s unclear and should be more detailed. I hope that is addressed.”
Second is the question of whether aldermen should push Yale to reopen the agreement and maybe provide another payment. “A number of alderpeople want to see that happen.”
Elicker said he hasn’t made up his mind about it yet. He and Westville’s outgoing Alderman Greg Dildine both expressed a hope that Yale and the city can continue to have good relations.
“Yale does a lot for the city. That’s clear,” Elicker said.
Westville Alderman-elect Adam Marchand (Dildine’s replacement) and Hill Alderwoman Jackie James, who’s returning for another term in January, both said the next step is discussion. They said they aren’t sure whether the outcome should be asking Yale for more money.
“Sandwich” Calling Plan
One incoming alderwoman, however, said she’s ready to ask Yale for cash in exchange for continued street closure.
“I almost looked at it like cellphones,” said Morrison, a Dixwell neighborhood-alderwoman elect, after the meeting. When your deal is up with Verizon after two years, you have to renew the contract if you want the service to continue, she said. “It’s almost the same thing for me.”
“Yale is definitely in a position to help the city,” she said. While the city and its taxpayers are in tight financial straits, the university has a lot of money, she said.
“I want a sandwich and all I have is bread and you have meat and mayonnaise — why can’t you share that with me?” Morrison said. “So we all can eat?”
She was asked about the danger that Yale might take the meat away if the city asks for more mayonnaise.
Yale has a whole picnic basket, Morrison replied. They have an obligation to share it.
“Come on Yale, you have potato chips!” Morrison said. “Give us some of your chips. It’s OK.”
“They have tomatoes, soda, juice, chips and everything else,” she said. “They’re a huge corporation.”
“We need help,” she said. “The bottom line is we need help.”
Morrison acknowledged the possibility that Yale may reduce its voluntary payments if the city asks for more.
“I believe that we have to take the risk,” she said. “The question goes back to Yale: Why don’t you want to help us?”
The Most Generous University On Earth
Yale has already helped the city far more than the 1990 agreement originally called for, Morand argued after Wednesday evening’s meeting.
The university has twice, on its own, raised its annual voluntary contribution, Morand said. The agreement has been mutually beneficial, he said. “It shows partnership works.”
New Haven’s “hometown university” makes the “largest voluntary payments of any university in the nation by far,” Morand said. He later expanded that statement to the entire planet. Yale giving comes despite the fact that it is not the largest university in terms of students or budget.
Asked if Yale would be willing to pay more for continued closure of the streets, Morand repeated the list of benefits the city has received from Yale voluntarily since 1990. He mentioned $25 million through the Yale homebuyer program, support for creation of a community bank, $1.6 million annually to the Economic Development Corporation of New Haven over the last three years, the New Haven Open At Yale, and a $4 million annual pledge to the Promise program.
“No other university does that.”