Thomas Breen photo
Brandi Marshall greets incoming Acting Chief Dominguez (center).
Brandi Marshall rushed out of her Winchester Avenue home when she saw the mayor, the soon-to-be new acting police chief, and nearly a dozen top city cops knocking doors on her block.
Her message: Thanks for coming to Newhallville. Please come back soon, and often.
Marshall delivered that message Thursday afternoon during a neighborhood walk by Mayor Justin Elicker, Newhallville Alder Delphine Clyburn, Asst. Police Chiefs Renee Dominguez and Karl Jacobson, and a cadre of Newhallville beat cops and district managers from across the city.
Dominguez and Lt. Mark O’Neill at the front of the pack.
Starting at 4 p.m. at the police substation at Winchester Avenue and Starr Street, the group walked block by block up the avenue, canvassing neighbors and stuffing mailboxes with pamphlets detailing crime prevention, bike safety, and how to become a New Haven police officer.
The neighborhood walk took place two days before Dominguez is slated to take control of the department as acting police chief when outgoing Chief Otoniel Reyes starts burning remaining vacation time before officially retiring at the end of June.
Other top neighborhood cops on the walk included Newhallville’s Lt. Manmeet Colon, Dwight’s Lt. John Healy, Downtown’s Lt. Sean Maher, Fair Haven’s Sgt. Michael Fumiatti, and Westville’s Lt. Elliot Rosa, among others.
“Working in this neighborhood helped me be able to talk to people, and taught me how to be a police officer,” said Dominguez (pictured), a 21-year NHPD veteran who was a patrol officer in Newhallville from 2002 and 2013 and the neighborhood’s district manager from 2017 to 2019.
“When you’re out here for a long time, you make connections.”
Many of the Newhallville residents whom the mayor, Dominguez, Alder Clyburn, and various top cops spoke to on Thursday afternoon greeted the city and law enforcement officials with a similar message, perhaps best encapsulated by Marshall (pictured).
“There are people who care a lot about this neighborhood, who love this neighborhood,” she said. “I want to see you guys here often. We don’t want our kids to be afraid of the police. We need to bridge that gap.”
She said she would love to see more police officers walking the beat in her neighborhood to show Newhallville residents that the city is interested in “getting rid of these dope pushers.”
“I want to go back to community policing,” said Marshall, who works as a cook at the Whitney Center, has lived in the neighborhood for nearly 10 years, and grew up in Dixwell’s Florence Virtue Homes.
Marshall said that the neighborhood takes pride in its sense of community, in backpack giveaways and food drives that neighbors lead and participate in. It’s been hard during the pandemic, she said, but it’s encouraging to see city officials walking through.
“When the police are present, when the mayor is present, people pay attention.”
Nelson, Lts. Fumiatti and Maher, and Brooks.
Across the street, Fumiatti and Maher spoke with Yavanda Nelson and Ron Brooks about how life in Newhallville is these days, and about what they’d like to see from the police department
Nelson said she’s troubled by groups of kids on bikes rolling through the neighborhood, harassing passerby.
“Crime would go down if they see you out here,” she said.
“I would say more of a walking presence,” added Brooks.
How do you feel about cops on bikes? asked Maher. Brooks and Nelson said they loved the idea. Maher said the department is trying to train more officers on how to conduct bike patrols, so that they can cover larger swaths of area than they would be able to on foot, but also so neighbors can have more in-person interactions with cops than if they were just in their patrol cars.
“We’re doing pretty good,” Treg Wilson (pictured) said when he answered Lt. Colon’s knock on his front door.
Is there anything you need? she asked. Do the kids in the house have Chromebooks? Is your landlord treating you OK?
“We’re living in the slum part of the city,” Wilson said with a shrug. Colon urged him to reach out if he has any problems, to not feel like he has to live in substandard conditions.
Have you gotten vaccinated yet? asked Mayor Elicker.
“I’m not too keen on that,” Wilson replied. Elicker urged him to get a shot. The Covid-19 vaccines are safe and effective, he said, and hundreds of thousands of people around the state have already gotten inoculated.
When no one answered the door, the cops and city officials would leave pamphlets in the mailbox. Curious upper-floor tenants peered out their windows as a cluster of uniformed officers walked from door to door.
Kerry Tery (pictured) said she’s happy with how city police work in Newhallville today. “They’re great,” she said. “They’re doing it.”
Kenneth Cousar (pictured) said he remembered Dominguez from her time walking the beat in the neighborhood nearly two decades ago. “I remember she was honest and fair. She’s going to make a great chief.”
“They’re doing a hell of a job,” said Jerry Paige, on his way to pick up a bite at the corner store.
The 55-year-old Newhallville native said he feels “pretty safe” in the neighborhood.
“We’ve got seven homicides already this year,” he said with concern about the city as a whole. “That’s bad enough.”
But as for his experience with the police in Newhallville in particular, “I’ve got no complaints.”
Dominguez leaving lit on Winchester.