2034 Goals Get Clearer

What will New Haven look like in ten years? On Tuesday night, Vision 2034 hosted its fourth workshop to help answer this question. 

Residents joined the Zoom call to brainstorm ideas for the city’s ​“Comprehensive Plan.” That’s a collection of urban planning priorities — around zoning changes and transportation upgrades and climate resiliency goals — that the city is required to put together every 10 years. 

Put another way, the plan is a way for New Haveners to envision their most ideal city. The plan will be used by government officials in the next decade to help guide them through which projects to focus on and invest in for the city.

“Equity and resilience are priorities for this plan, and they’re going to be the lenses that we look through for all of the work that we do,” Assistant Director of Comprehensive Planning Esther Rose-Wilen said.

The City Plan department has already host three three workshops, in April, May, and June, to begin collecting public input on what should go into this latest once-a-decade plan. At the start of the Tuesday night meeting, residents brought up familiar points: rent prices, transportation, climate change adaptability.

The focus for this meeting zeroed in on community engagement. How can the community become, and remain, engaged in caring about the city? And what are the steps to making these changes? 

IfeMichelle Gardin, executive director and founder of KulturallyLIT, a literary arts organization to cultivate awareness around African diasporic literature, led the workshop that helped residents reflect on these questions. Residents were encouraged to write poetry and songs and even draw their ideas — though only verbal testimonies were shared.

Cordalie Benoit was a part of an earlier committee that helped draft the 2015 Plan. Benoit noted that the improvements mentioned at that meeting, almost two decades ago, were eventually implemented by the city — especially transportation.

“I think that there’s some sensitivity to some of the issues that came up, for sure,” Benoit said. ​“Certainly the transportation is getting better. Now you can ride a bike without worry. There’s places to ride bikes, and there’s bike lanes and things like that.”

But this sense of progress is being muddled through bureaucracy, according to City Plan Commissioner Leslie Radcliffe, discouraging residents from getting involved. Radcliffe referenced a phrase she had heard: ​“if it’s rats, it’s rats,” emphasizing community members’ quick acceptance of less than optimal conditions. Radcliffe noted that she held the ​“leaders of our community” responsible, for not being transparent to residents about the process.

“If a community says ​‘we need our sidewalks fixed,’ some of us know, with the municipal process, that what seems to be a very simple thing can take time,” Radcliffe said. ​“If you don’t understand or know the process, it just seems like nothing’s being done.”

Resident Myra Smith doubled down on this disconnect between community members’ needs and city developments, pointing to the (now-stalled) housing development pitched for Davenport Avenue. (“It’s ridiculous. We can’t afford a 1 bedroom starting at $2,300. No one can.”) And Rosalyn Johnson-Harris— one of ten community navigators who do outreach for the project — noticed the same sense of apathy in the residents she spoke with: ​“They say that they don’t think their opinions matter because they’ve had these opinions for years and years, not really seeing much difference in the overall impact in their decisions.”

Other suggestions included ways to increase this transparency between the city’s efforts and the community’s needs. Radcliffe suggested celebrating the ​“little victories” more, empowering residents with a sense of progress. And resident Anstress Farwell suggested that City Hall employees, too, should have their own workshop or survey to see their own ideas on improving transparency with residents.

The meeting ended with a call for creative work, which the panel will pick to be included in the plan. Creative writing and art can be submitted in this link here. The next workshop will be on Sept. 28 which will focus on arts and culture.