Paul Bass Photos
Jones (right) and Boyd detail plans.
Smith crashes session.
The new organizers of the Freddy (formerly “Freddie”) Fixer Parade began detailing plans for this year’s march along with new fundraising events — while the former organizer dropped his threat of a lawsuit to stop them.
The olive branch was extended Wednesday during a second-floor meeting room of City Hall.
There, nine city officials convened a logistics planning meeting with Dexter Jones and Howard Boyd, president and vice-president respectively of Elm City Freddy Fixer Parade 2016, to discuss permits, routes and other details for the upcoming May 15 event, the New Haven black community’s largest annual celebration.
Organizers formed the new parade organization with the help of city officials who were pressing the former organizer of the parade, Maurice Smith, to broaden his community outreach and start raising some of the $30,000-$35,000 annual cost of city government support.
Smith slipped into the meeting partway through, hours after an article appeared in the Independent in which he blasted the city for deciding to award the permits to the new group rather than the official Freddie (spelled with an “ie”) Fixer organization that Smith heads.
Smith, who revived the parade in 2009, sat at the edge of the room, listened for a while, his presence obvious but unremarked upon in the wake of weeks of public tensions.
Then Smith asked to speak. Heads turned. Rather than blast the meeting, Smith asked a couple of organizational questions, about the route and permits.
Before finishing, Smith turned to Boyd and Jones, who helped him out with past parades before breaking off to help form the new group this year.
“I’m somewhat stunned and surprised that you guys would develop this,” he said.
Then he added, “I’ll extend an olive branch and wish you guys the best.”
Smith left. Afterwards he told the Independent that he had changed his mind about filing suit after listening to his former comrades discuss logistics that Smith said he had mastered in years past.
“I can’t do that. I can’t go against people I know,” he said. “These guys need my help.”
Back in the meeting room, after the session broke up, Jones spoke of new plans for this year’s parade.
The route will be condensed: Rather than start at the Hamden border, at Dixwell Avenue and Arch Street, it will launch from Bassett and Dixwell in New Haven before proceeding to the edge of downtown. That will save money on Hamden police overtime, Jones said. In addition, it will focus the parade; hardly anyone form the public lines the sidewalks until the parade reaches Bassett anyway, Jones noted.
He also listed a slew of planned fundraising events, most though not all of them new this year, to help defray police overtime and other municipal costs. The planned fundraisers include:
• A “badges and shields” party at the Webster Street Elks Club the Friday night before the parade. Police and fire contingents from throughout the region will be invited to participate before marching in the parade on Sunday. Jones said he expects cops and firefighters from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and Massachusetts.
• An “all-star basketball” game between New Haven and New York City teens, at Wilbur Cross High School, the Saturday before the parade.
• A “Greek step show” in the Cross auditorium the same day.
• A series of jazz brunches at black-owned venues around town the Saturday and Sunday of parade weekend, including events at Jackie’s, Park Place East, and the Knickerbockers Club.
And starting this Friday, a “Rescue the Freddy” campaign will begin at the McDonald’s on Whalley Avenue closest to downtown. Customers will be asked to contribute a dollar toward the parade’s costs.
Soon after the parade, the organization will begin raising money for next year’s event, Jones said. Planned events include an “all white affair” at the Terminal 110 club with the Pop Warner baseball league.
City officials said that they expect local organizations to contribute an undefined “percentage” of the police overtime and other municipal costs when they hold parades.
“I’m trying to get the whole nut,” Jones said. “I’m trying to get the whole $30,000.”
In addition to the fundraisers, Yale Medical School plans to conduct a health fair at Stetson Branch Library on the Saturday before the parade.
An earlier version of this article follows.
City Selects New “Freddy” Fixer Group
Paul Bass Photo
Bartlett leaving corporation counsel office late Tuesday.
Smith at the 2015 parade.
The Harp administration notified the most recent organizer of the Freddie Fixer Parade Thursday afternoon that it will grant the permit for this year’s event to a new breakaway group.
The organizer, Maurice Smith, responded with a vow to sue to stop the new group from staging the parade.
That was the upshot of a meeting that occurred Thursday afternoon in the Office of the Corporation Counsel on the fourth floor of City Hall. It brought to a head a dispute that has brewed for weeks, with the annual event less than two months away. This year’s parade is scheduled for May 15.
Mayoral aide Jason Bartlett called the meeting with Maurice Smith, head of the official Freddie Fixer organization. Smith revived the parade and has run it for the past several years.
Smith ended up not attending the meeting, which began at 4 p.m. An attorney named Josephine Miller represented him.
The Harp administration, through Bartlett, has urged Smith to broaden the community’s participation in the organization. It also urged Smith to come up with a plan to raise some money to help offset the city’s police and other costs associated with the parade. Smith accused the Harp administration of trying to to take the parade away from him. Meanwhile, some community members who previously worked with Smith formed an organization called Elm City Freddy Fixer Parade 2016, to plan to run the parade themselves.
“We have adopted the ‘y’ instead of the ‘ie,’” the group wrote, in reference to the spelling of “Freddy” on its Facebook page. “Let’s make this parade special. Get on board. It belongs to us all.”
New group’s logo, with the “Freddy” spelling.
With a Wednesday deadline looming to grant a permit for the parade, Bartlett informed Miller Tuesday afternoon that the city has selected the new Elm City organization instead of Smith’s organization.
Bartlett said the city has tried to work with Smith to get some reimbursement for parade expenses since 2011, with no success. He said the city swallowed the full $35,000 cost for police overtime and other costs for the 2015 parade, as well as the full $30,000 for the 2014 parade. Other parades, Bartlett said, pay “a percentage” of municipal costs.
“He has not made any effort to pay. He hasn’t demonstrated any capacity” to raise money, Bartlett said. “We can’t keep asking the taxpayers to foot the bill.”
The new organization does not have 501(c)3 status. Bartlett said the organization has found another not-for-profit to serve as its fiscal agent for the parade. Bartlett and another Harp administration official, Jackie James, have spoken of staging fundraising events like an African-American food truck festival at Dixwell Plaza.
Bartlett added that he’s “hopeful” the new group will include Smith in the parade planning. Dexter Jones, who runs the new group, told the Independent recently that the group respects the work Smith has put in over the years and hopes he’ll take part.
Attorney Miller after the powwow, conferring with Corporation Counsel John Rose.
Attorney Miller said after meeting that she was there to “gather information” for Smith. She declined further comment.
Reached by phone, Smith said he intends to file suit seeking an injunction against the new group obtaining the permit. He said he plans to argue that using the Freddie Fixer name is a “trademark violation.”
He said he has no intention of working with the new group, which he called illegitimate.
Smith also contested Bartlett’s version of events. “We weren’t obligated to pay them. We were only obligated to make a good-faith effort to raise money,” which his group did, Smith said.
At the 2015 parade.
He called the new group a City Hall-orchestrated set-up to wrest control of the parade from him. “They’re [the Harp administration] basically feeding this group. Everybody knows that.”
“There are going to be repercussions,” Smith vowed.
Community leaders formed the Freddie Fixer event in the early 1960s as part parade, part community clean-up drive. It grew into a multi-state draw for black police, fire, drill squad and other organized groups, complete with weekend-long events. “Freddie Fixer” was created as a fictional street-sweeping symbol for the event.
Previous coverage of this controversy:
• 1 Parade, 2 “Freddies”
• Freddie’s In A Fix