Neighbors Lacerate Strong School Proposal

Newman Architects

Rendering of Lazarus’s plan.

Allan Appel Photo

Bekhrad: “Ridiculous.”

Micro-apartments? Wrong for a family neighborhood.

Monthly rents up to $1,700? Non-starters for middle-to-low-income Fair Haven.

This developer? Troubling track record.

Fair Haveners bombarded a selection committee with that take on a developer’s proposal to buy the shuttered Strong School from the city for $500,000 and spend $16.7 million converting it into apartments.

The city set up the selection committee under the 1982 so-called Gan” decision process. That process grew out of the 1982 sale of the old Roger Sherman School (to Rabbi Daniel Greer’s parochial Gan School) to guarantee open bidding and sale of city surplus property to a qualified, not an insider, party.

The Strong selection committee met Wednesday night at the River Run development on Grand Avenue across form the vacant school to hear public input on the developer’s qualifications and his proposal’s viability. It received an earful — all critical of the idea of selling the property to the developer, Ted Lazarus and his Meriden-based Park Lane Group.

Markeshia Ricks Photo

Developer Ted Lazarus at a previous (contentious) Fair Haven meeting.

Lazarus was the only developer to respond to a request for proposals (RFP) from the city to buy and renovate the school, suggesting carving 37 micro-units into the 1916 building along with some community space. But Lazarus clashed form the start with Chatham Square neighbors whose own earlier proposal to turn the school into a mixed arts-community-housing complex never advanced to the approval stage.

The technical purpose of Wednesday night’s meeting was not to evaluate specifics of the proposal, like the tiny size of the apartments – although the committee allowed the 20 speakers among about 75 attendees at the River Run senior complex on Grand Avenue to do plenty of that.

Instead, per the Gan process, the hearing focused primarily on the financial and experience-based qualifications and bona fides of the applicant to carry out the project.

Mary Wade Home President and CEO David Hunter called the funding sources uncertain and other financial details presented in the proposal vague.” He questioned, for instance, a projection of near 100 percent occupancy in the first year.

I could not present these to my board and get this off the ground,” he said. He also bemoaned the lack of responsiveness from Lazarus to be in touch, to organize focus groups with Fair Haveners or to explore possible synergies” with the Mary Wade Home.

Allan Appel Photo

Fair Haven’s Sarah Miller speaks out against the plan.

I ran the numbers and none of this makes sense. The income and expense [figures] are not valid: $458,000 for a 300 square foot [unit] is ridiculous,” said architect Fereshteh Bekhrad.

She raised another recurrent theme in the other speakers’ objections: A 300 to 500 square foot [apartment] is for a transient individual,” not for the families with children, who are by and large the residents of Fair Haven.

Speaking to Lazarus’ history, experience, and character, Fair Haven Community Management Team Vice Chair Sally Esposito reported that she went online and found several current court cases against Lazarus’ Park Lane Group related to current projects. I’m concerned with the trustworthiness of the developer. I’d ask the committee to do due diligence” she concluded.

Photo of developer’s 810 Boston Ave, Bridgeport building, presented by Manning to the committee.

Crystal Manning, who chairs the Chatham Square Neighborhood Association’s economic development committee, reported that she traveled to 810 Boston Ave. in Bridgeport, a building managed by Lazarus and his Park Lane Group. She provided the committee with pictures of what she saw: A grim, brick building, with a dumpster in front with rotting meat.”

I said [to myself], Don’t be judgmental,’” she recalled. So she waited for residents to come out and spoke to several, who reported the owner did fix things that broke, after a week.” Another resident said the owner cares only about the rent.”

Maybe I got the only two disgruntled people in the building. But this research bothers me,” she concluded.

Interior view of Lazarus proposal.

Many of the speakers had been prepped by Chatham Square organizers Lee Cruz and Sarah Miller, who were part of a previous rejected proposal that had focused on turning the school into primarily a community-based arts center. Wednesday night they prepared and presented to the committee a 20-page point by point rebuttal/response to the Lazarus proposal, complete with graphs and photographs prepared by a volunteer group of area residents.

Cruz also offered a personal story: His aunt until very recently had been living in an apartment in a building he said was very poorly maintained and operated by the Meriden Housing Authority. Mr. Lazarus/Park Lane proposes to partner with the same people [in the Lazarus proposal, those individuals are named as the Maynard Road Corporation] who operate the Meriden Housing Authority. They are so closely linked that the finances of the Meriden Housing Authority were presented as the finances of the respondent the Lazarus/Park Lane Group response to the RFP,” he stated in his prepared remarks.

Then Cruz presented pictures to the committee of Meriden Housing Authority buildings. The garbage, the filth, the lack of basic security, the inattention to damaged safety equipment was routine. The elevator that was not working was a regular occurrence. That’s a low level of property management unacceptable to [our] community.”

By design, Lazarus was not invited to attend or to respond to the comments, per the decision of the committee, which listened attentively and stoically to the comments.

When after two hours the speakers concluded, committee members, who will vote on the matter next week, offered some remarks. Committee member Ken Boroson, an architect, said he was impressed with the consistency of neighborhood feeling.” Fair Haven resident and committee member Jane Coppock said she was impressed with the care of the presentations.” And Ward 14 Alder Ken Reveiz said he was proud of the community’s vigorous response. It doesn’t feel like this is the project, the right fit for Fair Haven,” he concluded.

Committee members Pellegrino and Alder Jose Crespo.

Committee member Tony Pellegrino said he personally tried to reach Lazarus and his partners, but his calls were not returned. I see no support in the community for this,” Pellegrino said.

City Economic Development Administrator Matthew Nemerson told the room that the city is under pressure to find a developer and to sell the building because it now costs $80,000 a year to maintain it. He also argued that New Haven could use the new tax revenue.

According to the Gan process, the selection committee votes and makes a recommendation to Nemerson. A vote on that recommendation is expected next month.

But it’s only a non-binding recommendation. Nemerson can ignore it.

Proposal skeptics Maryann Moran, Helene Sapadin, Sally Esposito.

Can Nemerson override the decision of the committee? Technically he can, he confirmed.

However, in a subsequent phone conversation after the meeting, Nemerson said: I’m not going to do anything diametrically opposed to what a broad-based board of advisers decides. Because I’m a member of the committee, it’s likely we’ll come up with a consensus opinion.”

At this point we’ve had only one close developer over five years” of trying to find someone to renovate the vacant building, Nemerson said. Maybe that’s evidence this building can’t be developed/ People [at the meeting] seemed to be asking for things that no one can do. If it can’t be paid for and it can’t be developed, we have to ask what the use of this parcel is. But that’s way down the road. I wish we had more applicants.”

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