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Thomas Breen |
Aug 20, 2024 3:10 pm
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Mike Gormany: Working on the weekends to help new city budget director transition into the role.
The Elicker administration has contracted with the city’s former budget director to help the city’s new budget director transition into her role, with an indefinite agreement that pays $55 an hour for up to 19 hours a week.
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Laura Glesby |
May 29, 2024 5:49 pm
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Morris Cove Alder Sal DeCola introduces the ammo-storage amendment.
In a last-minute federal funding reallocation on Tuesday evening, alders unanimously voted to spend $250,000 in Covid-recovery aid on a new police ammunition storage unit.
Finance Chair Marchand, second from right, led committee in approving some — but not all — new city positions.
A key committee of alders endorsed a city budget with standalone housing code enforcement and parks departments, though with fewer positions than the mayor had wanted.
They also advanced a 3.49 percent rise in the mill rate, rather than the 3.98 percent increase the mayor had proposed.
LCI's Javier Ortiz investigates conditions in a Vernon St. apartment.
Liam Brennan, hired by city to review LCI.
A former mayoral candidate has been tapped to guide future reforms to enhance housing code and blight enforcement at the Livable City Initiative (LCI), as the Board of Alders reviews a mayoral proposal to remove affordable housing development from that city agency’s work.
NHFD Paramedic Keith Kerr treats man who overdosed on heroin.
The number of paramedics employed by the city’s fire department has plummeted from around 40 a few years ago to just 15 today — hiking mandatory overtime and prompting the city to recruit workers from out of town and state.
Only one kind of grass allowed for public mower job hopefuls.
City of New Haven job posting
Pre-employment drug test required for seasonal parks caretaker job.
If you want to make $18 an hour cutting grass in the city’s parks this summer, then you better not smoke grass before applying for the job.
Because New Haven requires prospective seasonal parks workers to pass a drug test, including for marijuana, even though recreational cannabis is now legal statewide.
Chief Jacobson: "We see what happens if our officers aren't well."
Sometimes police respond over and over again to the same address for mental health calls that would best be served by an agency like Clifford Beers or COMPASS or the Veterans Affairs medical center.
So the city’s police department wants to add a new lieutenant position focused on making sure those connections take place — for the betterment of community and officer “health and wellness” alike.
The Elicker administration plans to use $2 million in soon-to-expire federal pandemic-relief funds to cover the entirety of a proposed increase to the police department’s overtime budget.
And what will happen when those one-time Covid dollars from D.C. run out next fiscal year? The city plans to lean on unspent salary from a recurring abundance of unfilled police officer positions to help close the extra-duty-expenditures gap.
FY25 general fund, mill rate proposals in comparison to previous four years.
Taxes would rise — and city government would reshuffle its approach to inspecting housing and caring for parks — in a new city budget Mayor Justin Elicker proposed Friday.
Gormany and Matteson at Thursday's Finance meeting.
The Elicker administration won a key initial vote of support for its plan to increase pay for department heads, coordinators, and other non-unionized managers, as an aldermanic committee endorsed salary range bumps and cost of living adjustments in an effort to ward off even more City Hall vacancies.
Acting Controller Mike Gormany and Mayor Elicker: "Remarkable progress" on city's financial front.
Higher than expected property tax collections, building inspection revenue, interest rates, and city employee vacancies helped New Haven’s budget end last fiscal year more than $22 million in the black.
After the city sends roughly $15 million of that surplus towards a record police-misconduct settlement, that means the city can bank another $7 million-plus for a rainy day.
Clockwise from top left: Mayoral candidates Shafiq Abdussabur, Liam Brennan, Wendy Hamilton, and Tom Goldenberg at Tuesday's debate.
A network of green spaces linking every public park in New Haven. A larger role for people of color and women in building the city’s physical landscape. A pedestrian walkway connecting Union Station to Downtown. A ban on new parking lots and garages in favor of playgrounds.
Finance Committee Chair and Westville Alder Adam Marchand, rising in support of the new $662.7M FY24 budget.
City of New Haven data
Assessor's office estimates of FY24 tax bill bumps.
Tax bills are heading up next fiscal year — even as the tax rate drops — thanks to the Board of Alders’ unanimous approval of a final budget that preserves the mayor’s top-line expenditure, revenue, and mill rate numbers.
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Thomas Breen |
May 10, 2023 3:04 pm
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Nora Grace-Flood photo
Rick Woods contributing to city coffers outside Affinity.
City government picked up extra cash for cleaner streets and other state-allowed public service programs as local sales rack up for legal pot and mini-liquor-bottle “nips.”
by
Thomas Breen |
Apr 24, 2023 2:44 pm
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On the job at a Chapel Street construction site.
A city plumbing inspector is rising the ranks to become New Haven’s next top building official — as the department he’ll run continues to struggle to hire enough inspectors to meet the demands of the city’s construction boom for sub-suburban pay.
The Board of Alders Finance Committee heard over 50 last-minute pitches for more funding for these critical needs as they wrap up their review of next year’s city budget.
by
Laura Glesby and Thomas Breen |
Apr 21, 2023 3:37 pm
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Laura Glesby Photos
Myra Smith: "Even those who have affordable housing are living in deplorable conditions."
Around a hundred education, climate, library, transit, and housing advocates sat through hours of public testimony on Thursday night.
A resounding call for more affordable housing and better housing code enforcement filled the Board of Alders’ chambers, as roughly 100 community members gathered for a final round of public testimony on next fiscal year’s proposed city budget.
Brennan (right) with Fabian Menges, Max Choulideer, and Dave Cruz-Bustamante.
Don’t rely just on bashing Yale and begging the state when it comes to raising enough money to fill city budget gaps.
Liam Brennan offered those words of caution as he pitched his mayoral campaign’s vision for how best to craft a “fair share,” pro-housing budget that rethinks the bounds of permissible local government action.
by
Amanda Watts, Jessica Stamp and Luke Melonakos-Harrison |
Apr 18, 2023 2:18 pm
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Thomas Breen file photo
LCI's Javier Ortiz on a recent housing code inspection.
If Mayor Elicker wants to improve public health and safety in New Haven, he must invest in stronger housing code enforcement in this year’s budget and increase tenant oversight of the Livable City Initiative (LCI).
Librarians Soma Mitra and Phillip Modeen at a November City Hall rally.
The main library at 133 Elm.
Pay the city’s top librarian a higher salary. Pay every library worker a higher salary.
Interim City Librarian Maureen Sullivan made that funding pitch as she detailed the budget asks for one of New Haven’s most cherished and nationally celebrated public services — which, she argued, could do with a little more city fiscal love.
Supt. Tracey: "I might be leaving here not closing a budget" if full $207M is not approved.
NHPS slide
Top school-district officials pitched alders on sending the Board of Education $207 million next fiscal year — as they made their case for why rising teacher salaries and special education costs warrant $4 million more than what the mayor has proposed.
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Maya McFadden |
Mar 23, 2023 10:16 am
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NHPS slide
The school district's FY24 budget request.
The Board of Education voted unanimously to approve a proposed $207 million schools budget request for next fiscal year, teeing up that financial plan — which is more than $3 million above what the mayor has proposed sending the district’s way — for review by the Board of Alders.
