At the meeting, the committee held a public hearing to discuss lawn pesticides and artificial turf and heard an update from the New Haven Climate Movement about the city’s progress in implementing the New Haven Community Electrification Resolution, which was passed three years ago and requires the city to develop and adhere to a schedule for replacing several infrastructure systems with electric alternatives. Laura Cahn, the chair of the city’s Environmental Advisory Committee, presented on pesticides and urged the city to rethink its system of licensing officials that use pesticides. New Haven Climate Movement representative Krishna Davis ’25 and Steve Winter, New Haven’s Office of Climate and Sustainability director, testified about electrification.

“The planet is gasping for air, and we are holding a plastic bag around it,” Cahn said, describing the urgency of her environmental work.

Cahn suggests goats, leaf blower regulations to curb pesticide use

Although the Board of Alders previously passed a resolution implementing a “voluntary ban” on lawn chemicals, Cahn testified that many residents still use pesticides on their lawns. Because Connecticut state law prohibits municipalities from actually banning pesticides, the Board’s resolution was largely symbolic.

Cahn pointed to Tweed New Haven Airport as a large user of pesticides because the Federal Aviation Association requires the airport to keep its sidelines clear. Cahn suggested using goats as an alternative to chemicals to keep out invasive plants. The city has previously used goats to clear invasive plant growth in Edgewood Park in 2018 — which Cahn also claims was her idea.

“They did such a good job eating the invasive species, they sent them home early,” Cahn said. “They are a huge visitor draw because they’re lovely goats — you just have to be careful not to let them out where they can eat your flowers.”

Cahn cautioned about the potential for leaf blowers to spread pesticide toxins, especially when pesticides are used near schools or residential areas.

She said that pesticides are commonly used on utility infrastructure like railroads and electric lines, and on golf courses and athletic fields. 

“Golf was invented in Scotland,” Cahn said. “Obviously they didn’t use pesticides in Scotland on their golf courses and so the fact that we’ve adopted their sport and tried to make it work in our territory by using these artificial means is very, very concerning,” Cahn said.

She also claimed that several of the employees she has seen applying pesticides are not licensed by the state to do so. If a company is licensed, Cahn claimed, not every employee will be individually certified.

In that vein, Cahn advocated for the city to make a registry of every licensed lawn care and landscaping company, to keep track of their use of pesticides and make sure that they don’t magnify the risk of the chemicals by using leaf blowers.

“New Haven does not know who is doing these things in our city,” Cahn said. 

Cahn also warned the committee about the danger of artificial turf, which requires pesticides for its maintenance. Artificial turf is used for athletic fields throughout the city.

After Cahn concluded her presentation, Alder Kianna Flores ’25 asked about education campaigns to raise awareness of the danger of pesticides and their continued use. In response, Cahn said that she has not come up with an effective way to educate people, because she believes people do not want to fully comprehend something that is so bad for them.

“I don’t think it’s by accident that nobody knows about this,” Cahn said. “I’m pretty sure it is a dedicated advertising campaign, just like cigarettes, just like alcohol, to get you to do something toxic to yourself.” 

Cahn then provided an update on the EAC’s current work, which includes monitoring initiatives such as a private recycling facility on the water, bird-safe building legislation, Tweed’s expansion, greenspace in public housing developments, garbage from Long Wharf food trucks and the possibility of a statewide ban on nip bottles that contain small quantities of alcohol.

Update from New Haven Climate Movement, electrification goals

Following Cahn’s presentation, Krishna Davis ’25 spoke on behalf of the New Haven Climate Movement’s Electric Future Committee about the city’s progress towards meeting the electrification goals it laid out in its 2021 electrification resolution. 

“We cannot meet our 2030 climate goals without persistent efforts of the city aligned with the commitments made in the electrification resolution in 2021,” Davis said. 

Although he recognized the city’s efforts to electrify some buildings, Davis called for the city to incentivize developers of new buildings in New Haven to only use electric sources of energy and report their carbon emissions to both the city and the public throughout the entire development process. 

According to Davis, the Electric Future Committee has found that only three of nearly 50 new construction projects in New Haven in the last 10 years have been completely electric.

Davis also said that other cities with climate goals similar to New Haven like Ithaca, New York which he said have taken more serious action to increase electrification.

“New Haven should follow Ithaca’s lead and cities like Ithaca, and make electrification a serious policy priority,” he said.

In response to Davis’ requests, Alder Festa reminded the audience that a new electric refuse truck should be arriving in New Haven soon. This new garbage truck will be arriving thanks to a grant that Steve Winter, director of the Office of Climate and Sustainability, applied for. He has since applied for another grant in hopes of securing a second refuse vehicle for New Haven. 

Following Davis’ presentation, Winter discussed the progress the city has made since passing the electrification resolution nearly three years ago.

For one, the city has worked to electrify its light fleet, purchasing seven Chevrolet Volts for city officials to use. According to Winter, New Haven will receive a $7,500 check directly from the federal government for each Volt they purchased. He also said that for every heavy-duty vehicle the city purchases, such as refuse vehicles, the federal government would write New Haven a check for 30 percent of the cost, with a cap of $40,000 per vehicle. 

The Office of Climate and Sustainability has also been working with The City Plan Department to write zoning language that incentivizes developments to be constructed completely electrically. He discussed a point system that will grant developers density bonuses for their projects.

“You can get five points if it’s all-electric, five points if it’s mass timber, and if you’ve got something that has solar, timber and all-electric, as well, you can get 12 points,” he said, regarding the point system. “And the 12 points are important thresholds where you get a density bonus.”

Winter also discussed his progress in outfitting buildings with heat pumps to replace gas heating systems. So far, the Office of Climate and Sustainability has worked on retrofitting community centers, youth recreation centers and senior centers with heat pumps. 

Alder Festa is the chair of the CSEP committee.

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If approved, the proposal will split the Livable City Initiative. The newly created Office of Housing and Community Development will take responsibility for the creation of new housing in the city, while LCI will solely focus on housing inspections. The mayor also hopes to add eight new housing-related positions. 

City activists have critiqued LCI due to delayed inspection and unresolved complaints, often leaving tenants waiting months without receiving support from the city.

“It’s clear every day that housing is one of the biggest challenges that we’re facing as a city,” Elicker told the News. “While we’ve made a lot of progress, we have a lot more work to do, in particular, in two areas. One is increasing the number of affordable units in the city, and two is … improving our ability to inspect existing housing stock to ensure that it is safe.”

In total, these two housing programs will get more than $1.4 million in additional funding compared to the last fiscal year. Elicker’s proposed budget also allocates an additional $300,000 to support unhoused people. 

The proposed Office of Housing and Community Development

Included in the city budget is Elicker’s proposal to create a new Office of Housing and Community Development, which will partner with local organizations to build new housing and administer grants for future housing projects. If approved, the office will be a part of the city’s Economic Development Administration Division.

Currently, the Livable City Initiative is responsible for this work. 

Staff at the LCI who worked on housing development will be transferred to the new office, and an additional position — deputy director of Economic Development Administration — will be created to oversee it, according to Elicker. 

“It’s more appropriate for this work to be done within the Economic Development Administration,” Elicker said. “Economic development is the place [to which] developers first go when they’re wanting to start projects.”

Michael Piscitelli, the head of the city’s Economic Development Administration Department, explained that the new office will distribute funding for ongoing housing projects. According to Piscitelli, there are currently 3,500 new housing units in the city’s development pipeline — about 40 percent of which are affordable. 

Some of these projects are led by the city, such as a new series of townhouses on Grand Avenue, while other units are being built by external housing developers. The new office will support the projects by monitoring construction and providing technical assistance on grant applications.

In addition to supporting housing construction, the office will be in charge of administering grants for construction projects approved by the Board of Alders. Some of these grants include funding from the federal Office of Housing and Urban Development, which annually administers between $3 and $4 million in funds to the city of New Haven. Additionally, the office will draw on funds from the 2021 American Rescue Plan.

Piscitelli noted the need for affordable housing across the state of Connecticut. He said that the city has built 1,900 new affordable housing units in recent years but that the overall gap in affordable housing in Connecticut is upwards of 90,000 units. The new office will help improve housing policy, looking to increase the number of affordable units in the city, Piscitelli said.

Changes and improvements to LCI

The budget proposal will also add seven new staff positions with the Livable City Initiative, the agency that, under the proposed plan, will focus only on enforcing housing code and public space requirements throughout the city.

“I think [it’s] very important for LCI to focus on the core mission, what it was originally created for, which is ensuring our existing housing stock is of high standards,” Elicker said. 

Five of the proposed staff are housing inspectors, who, if approved by alders, will join the current team of 13 inspectors. 

According to Elicker, the attorney employed at LCI will join the Office of Housing and Community Development. The mayor thus proposed adding an attorney who will continue to work with LCI on housing compliance and inspections. LCI will also receive a new administrative assistant.

According to Piscitelli, these new positions will expand LCI’s capacity to engage in on-site inspections of rental units and section eight units on behalf of the city’s housing authority. 

LCI’s work entails a multi-step process of inspecting units, issuing orders based on code enforcement inspection and ensuring that landlords comply with these orders. Piscitelli said that staff expansion would increase efficiency within the agency, allowing LCI to make better use of government resources and increase the timeliness of their work. 

“We’ll be expecting a high level of process improvements such that we’re good on the timelines and we address the issues and make sure that our outcomes are good for the tenant who may live in the unit,” Piscitelli said.

Karen DuBois-Walton, the executive director of New Haven’s Housing Authority, noted the significance of improving LCI’s efficiency. 

“The city must increase its capacity to meet the requirements of the landlord licensing program,” DuBois-Walton wrote in an email to the News. “City resources can be most effective [by diving responsibilities].”

Alder Adam Marchand, a chair of the Board of Alders finance committee, which plays a major role in the budget adoption process, commended Elicker for paying attention to housing in his budget proposal. 

The finance committee will have its first budget public hearing on March 14.

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The center will provide short-tcerm interventions for people who are experiencing a crisis and need stabilization, serving as an alternative destination to hospitalizations or jail. The center will be staffed 24/7, 365 days per year, with a multidisciplinary team of psychiatrists, nurses, licensed clinicians and peers with lived experience, according to outgoing Department of Community Resilience Director Carlos Sosa-Lombardo. The center can accommodate up to ten patients at a time, Celeste Cremin-Endes, the Connecticut State Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services’ Chief of State-Operated Services told the News. 

The city has not yet announced the center, and Lenny Speiller, the city’s communications director, declined to give further details on the center’s opening until they are finalized.

Continuum of Care’s Vice President of Acute and Forensic Services John Labieniec, who will be spearheading the project with Program Director of Emergency Response Services Wanda Jofre, told the News that the center will be located in the Beaver Hills neighborhood and that the team hopes construction will be done by early April so that the center can begin operations later that month.

“Our community is struggling with a homeless crisis and with the rise in mental health needs during an emergency we need more alternatives other than ‘Yale or jail,’” Labieniec wrote to the News, referring to the Yale New Haven Hospital.

Labieniec said that the project began when Continuum received a grant to explore 24-hour community-based “therapeutic” stabilization centers around the country as alternative treatment centers to emergency rooms for individuals struggling with behavioral health issues.

Labieniec and Jofre, both licensed social workers, received grants from the state and New Haven, and are partnering with the Connecticut Mental Health Center, the City’s Department of Community Resilience, the Elm City COMPASS mobile crisis team and New Haven police. Labieniec specifically thanked Sosa-Lombardo for his involvement in the project, calling him “instrumental” in making the vision for a crisis stabilization center a reality.

Cremin-Endes explained that Continuum’s state contract was awarded through a Request for Proposal — or RFP — process, where the state solicited bids from organizations looking to take on a project similar to the REST Center. The highest-scoring bid is then given the opportunity to negotiate a contract.

She said that the state’s grant is intended to cover the cost of the center’s operations, while the grant from the city funds the center’s physical construction.

Jorge X. Camacho LAW ’10, a criminal justice and policing law scholar, noted the significance of the REST Center’s 24/7 care model. He said that despite hotlines like 2-1-1 — which connects callers to New Haven’s Coordinated Access Network — being available 24/7, the services to which operators can connect patients are often unavailable. 

Labieniec said that the REST center will follow a “living room model” — providing services in a non-institutional, home-like environment. 

According to Sosa-Lombardo, the center will accommodate individuals who may arrive by ambulance, police transport or from a crisis team like COMPASS. The crisis team, also founded as a partnership between the city and Continuum of Care, offloads specific cases, like mental health crises, from the city’s emergency service departments.

“The model is meant to partner with police and mobile crisis [teams] and serve as that alternative,” wrote Labieniec. “The idea is no one is turned away.”

Camacho said that the community-centered approach to intervention brings the sophisticated treatment that would normally only be available in acute care settings to the location where patients live, making the treatment process, for mental health issues or drug abuse, less isolating than typical forms of intervention.

He also emphasized a trend of increasing enthusiasm by police officials to collaborate with these types of crisis intervention methods.

“[Intervention] does not pose an existential threat to police officers, or policing in itself, but it can be seen as a really useful and beneficial supplement to the efforts of police officers to effectuate public safety,” Camacho said.

Crisis Stabilization Units — or CSUs — have risen in popularity throughout the country. The Wellmore Behavioral Health non-profit treatment provider in Waterbury currently operates a 24-hour Urgent Crisis Center for children. Three other pediatric CSUs currently operate in the state — at Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital, the Village for Families and Children in Hartford and the Child and Family Agency of Southeastern Connecticut in New London — but each of the centers has placed a limit on daily capacity. When the REST Center begins operations, it will be the only such service for adults in Connecticut.

Continuum of Care was founded in 1966.

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The ceasefire resolution was proposed to the board on Nov. 28 by a coalition of advocates. After months of pro-Palestine protests, including a 25-minute interruption to Mayor Justin Elicker’s State of the City Address and a nearly three-hour-long “public hearing” on the steps of City Hall on Monday, Board President Tyisha Walker-Myers moved the resolution to the Committee of the Whole.  The committee is led by Alder Jeanette Morrison, and all 30 alders serve on it. On Wednesday night, the Board’s Legislative Director Al Lucas announced that the Committee of the Whole will meet remotely to discuss the resolution in May.

Morrison, who helped set the meeting date, said that the meeting is scheduled so late in the year to accommodate Ramadan, Easter and Passover — the last of which ends on April 30 this year.

“For this particular topic, we wanted to make sure that we were respectful of all religious beliefs,” she said.

New Haven residents have engaged in pro-Palestine protests since October, several of which have focused on encouraging the Board of Alders to consider legislation opposing Israel’s military offensive in Gaza, through which Israel has reportedly killed over 30,000 people, though experts believe thousands more to be dead under the rubble. Israel undertook the offensive in response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack on Israel, in which Hamas killed 1,200 people and took 250 people as hostages.

The current ceasefire resolution emphasizes the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and a rise in Islamophobia, antisemitism and anti-Palestinian sentiments and violence. It calls for an immediate and permanent ceasefire, the release of all hostages, the unrestricted entry of humanitarian assistance into Gaza, an end to the siege and blockade of Gaza and respect for international law by all parties.

Similar resolutions have been proposed to local governments in Connecticut towns such as Hartford, Bridgeport, Windsor and Hamden, where the Town Council heard four hours of public testimony urging the council to either support or oppose the legislation. Only Bridgeport and Windsor have voted to pass a ceasefire resolution.

Francesca Maria, an organizer with the New Haven Ceasefire Coalition who asked the News to refer to her using her middle name, said that the coalition will be spreading the word about the committee hearing and helping people prepare and sign up to give public testimony at the committee meeting.

“Everything we’ve done in Hamden and Hartford and Bridgeport and all the other cities where ceasefire resolutions are being considered,” Maria explained.

At the Hamden Town Council hearing, several residents affiliated with the Jewish Federation of Greater New Haven, the Yale Forum for Jewish Faculty and Friends and other religious and community groups testified in opposition to the ceasefire resolution.

According to an email obtained by the News, Gayle Slossberg, the chief executive officer of the Jewish Federation, reached out to the federation’s email list on Thursday morning informing people of how to submit testimony opposing the resolution.

“While we all mourn the loss of life and want peace in the region, these ceasefire resolutions are not about promoting peace. They only seek to delegitimize the State of Israel,” Slossberg wrote.

She wrote that the Federation will organize meetings and provide more information about testifying in the lead-up to the hearing.

Ina Silverman ’80 SPH ’83, a former alder and current co-chair of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation, said that she plans to testify at the hearing, but expressed doubt at its effect on an actual ceasefire, calling the hearing a “waste of alders’ time.”

“It is ironic this ceasefire resolution comes before the Board of Alders at the same time Israel has agreed to very difficult ceasefire conditions, while Hamas rejects a ceasefire and continues causing tremendous suffering to its own people and the 134 hostages it still refuses to release,” Silverman wrote to the News. “Maybe Hamas is waiting to hear what New Haven thinks first.”

Ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas broke down earlier this week, with both sides blaming the other for the failure to reach a deal.

The Jewish Federation and the Yale Forum for Jewish Faculty and Friends did not respond to further requests for comment.

Morrison, who is a social worker, explained that she decided to hold the meeting remotely in order to keep everyone safe, which she determined was necessary given the heightened emotions surrounding the ceasefire resolution that she has seen. Silverman expressed support for the virtual format, also citing safety concerns.

“I think it increases inaccessibility for people who are not comfortable with that technology,” Maria said. “At the same time, there have been public hearings on Zoom before.”

Nigel Harris, a Democratic Socialists for America member who is also active in the ceasefire coalition, believes that the Zoom format “disenfranchises” people who don’t have access to the technology needed to attend the meeting.

Morrison explained that she is working on creating a structure for the meeting that is “very specific in regard to the way in which this meeting will be conducted.” She is not yet sure of how many people will be permitted to give public testimony, but each testimony will be brief.

In Lucas’ email announcing the hearing, he instructed people signing up to give public testimony to clearly indicate whether they would be speaking for or against the resolution. Morrison explained that an even number of people will be permitted to speak in support and opposition.

“We have to make sure that that list is very, very clear and fair,” she said.

People interested in signing up to deliver public testimony or submit written testimony are instructed to email publictestimony@newhavenct.gov.

On Thursday night, after President Joe Biden voiced his support for an immediate six-week ceasefire in his State of the Union address, Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who represents New Haven, put out a statement clarifying her position.

“We must work to get more humanitarian aid into Gaza, free all the hostages held by Hamas, and enact a six-week ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas conflict that allows for the protection and survival of innocent Palestinian civilians caught in the middle of war,” DeLauro wrote. “I am glad that President Biden is using every lever to ensure that desperately needed aid gets to innocent Palestinian civilians, including the recently announced seaport that will be established in Gaza to distribute aid.”

DeLauro’s support for a six-week ceasefire differs from the ceasefire resolution’s demand for a permanent ceasefire.

DeLauro’s statement urged long-term regional stability between Israel and the Palestinian people, which she believes will include strong U.S. leadership to bring security and peace to the Middle East and a two-state solution.

The Board of Alders’ Committee of the Whole last met in June 2023 to discuss the charter revision proposal.

Ethan Wolin contributed reporting.

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A New Haven resident for over four decades, FitzGerald is a dedicated volunteer leader for Friends of Edgewood Park, a neighborhood organization linked with the Urban Resources Initiative that helps maintain the public park a block from her home. In the fall of 2022, FitzGerald and ParksFriends, a revived collective of park volunteers from around the city, began speaking with government officials about how the city could strengthen its Parks Department, a subsection of the Parks and Public Works department. One idea that emerged from these meetings was to separate the Parks Department from Public Works — a proposal included in Mayor Justin Elicker’s recently released budget.

“We had a talk with the mayor about what was important to us and basically, we were saying that particularly parks maintenance really needed support,” FitzGerald recalled from ParksFriends’ first Zoom meeting with Elicker. “I think that kind of changed the trajectory of his thinking.”

Elicker unveiled his city budget proposal for the 2024-25 fiscal year at a press conference last week. The budget will be discussed in a series of public hearings and workshops hosted by the Board of Alders’ Finance Committee throughout March, April and May before it is finalized and passed by the Board of Alders in June.

The mayor’s proposal would restructure the Parks Department with a focus on specialization and split it from the Public Works Department, with which it has been merged since 2020.

“The re-envisioned Parks Department is structured to improve community connection, cleanliness, infrastructure and field performance,” the mayor wrote in the budget. “Aligning operations both regionally and by the department, Parks will be able to focus on performance improvement from both the planning and operations lenses rather than crisis management that has dictated operations in recent years.”

A history of engagement

David Belowski, the chair of the Parks Commission who has served as a commissioner since 1993, said that the mayor’s decision to merge the Parks and Public Works departments in 2020 was motivated by a desire to “save taxpayers some money.”

Several Connecticut municipalities do have a merged Parks and Public Works Department, which could cut down on costs by having the two divisions share equipment and leadership, FitzGerald said.

“Sometimes it works, like in the town of Woodbridge, a town of 20,000 people,” Belowski said.  “Versus in the City of New Haven, it really didn’t work out.”

Belowski believes that the merged department encountered difficulties in combining employees belonging to two different union bargaining units. Parks Department employees are represented by UPSEU Local 424’s Parks and Blue Collar bargaining unit, while Public Works Department employees are represented by Local 424’s Public Works Laborers unit.

The different duties laid out by the two union contracts, Belowski said, kept the department’s responsibilities divided.

“If Public Works goes into parks to pick up trash, that’s against union rules,” Belowski said, as an example. “Parks employees are supposed to do that.”

FitzGerald did not see a drastic change in the Parks Department’s efficiency once the two departments were merged. Additionally, the merger did not help the chronic maintenance issues that the parks faced.

“Things certainly didn’t get better,” FitzGerald said. “To tell you the truth, to me, things were not good before because they’ve been underfunded for so long.”

From years of volunteering in New Haven parks, FitzGerald observed that the city has an incredible amount of greenspace, yet insufficient investment in maintaining it.

ParkScore, a park-rating index used by the Trust for Public Land to analyze a city’s park system, gave New Haven a score of 60.4 out of 100 in September 2021. ParkScore’s report notes that 96 percent of New Haven residents live within a 10-minute walk of a park — a major strength. However, New Haven’s park amenities and acreage rank “among the middle of the pack,” indicating that there is room to improve what residents enjoy once they get to the parks.

The report, which was produced one year after the merger and one year before ParksFriends’ meeting with Elicker, suggests that the biggest opportunity to improve New Haven’s park system is to increase the total investment in park and recreation facilities. It further notes that New Haven ranks among the lowest third of the country’s most populated cities in terms of spending per resident on Parks.

Both Belowski and FitzGerald described decades of gradual cuts to the Parks Department’s staff. When Belowski joined the commission, the separate Parks Department had over 110 employees. The current Parks staff amounts to 56, just over half of that number.

As concerns about maintenance grew, FitzGerald leaned into her network of Friends of Edgewood Park and volunteer groups at other New Haven parks — collectively, an email list community called ParksFriends — to begin advocating for the City to allocate more resources to parks.

“We were advocating mostly for more support for parks in last year’s budget, and secondarily, for separating Parks from Public Works,” FitzGerald recalled. “But our primary advocacy was really for more positions to maintain the parks better.”

Although FitzGerald did not personally view unmerging as a perfect solution, she described that many ParksFriends volunteers and parks commissioners were in favor of a separate department from the outset.

Budget revamps Parks, encourages specialization

The budget proposes 10 new positions to be created to run the department, and 56 positions to be transferred from existing departments — primarily the present Parks and Public Works Department. An Executive Director will be supported by two deputies — one focused on operations and the second on planning. The department will also hire an Administration and Finance manager.

When the Parks and Public Works Departments were merged in 2020, the City created the Youth and Recreation Department to house the former Parks Department’s recreation division. According to Deputy Chief Administrative Officer Rebecca Bombero, who oversees the Parks and Public Works Department and served as the director of the independent Parks Department from 2013 to 2020, the proposal for the Parks Department will not restore the old department’s full recreation division but does bring back its Outdoor Recreation component — activities that serve residents of all ages, not only youth.

For FitzGerald, the choice to keep parts of the Recreation Department with the Youth Department complicates the plan to unmerge.

“Now that’s a little sticky,” she said, of Recreation. “Who’s going where, when it becomes Parks again?”

According to the budget proposal, several recreation-related positions will be transferred from the Youth and Recreation Department to the new Parks Department, such as the outdoor adventure coordinator and rangers, whom the coordinator oversees.

The rangers will now be supported by three park district managers who will each oversee one of the city’s three Parks “districts” and act as a point-person for their district’s residents. The district manager model is similar to the city’s current organizational structure for the New Haven Police Department, which has four district managers overseeing ten districts, and the Livable Communities Initiative, which has nine neighborhood specialists. 

The existing Parks Maintenance division will be split into three specialty areas to “help build the workforce capacity and improve focus,” according to the budget. The Parks Grounds division will focus on trash, cleaning and grass maintenance and will identify infrastructure needs. The Facilities and Projects division, in charge of building maintenance, will focus on maintaining aging infrastructure. Lastly, the Athletics and Fields division, responsible for sports-related maintenance, will further specialize by creating four new roles: an assistant superintendent will oversee scheduling and planning for the Board of Education Athletics, Recreation and Leagues, a field foreperson will take the lead on field maintenance and two new field technicians will “excel in field preparations.”

The budget proposes that the new Parks Department’s total cost will be $6,923,024. An additional $291,065 will be allocated to the department in special funds, which are federal grants the city anticipates receiving but have not yet secured.

The newly separate public works agency was allocated a budget of $16,835,820. The budget proposes two new positions and 111 transferred from the current merged department.

Parks people prepare for budget process

Before unveiling the budget, the Mayor’s office held meetings with residents engaged with the Parks department beginning in December 2023, Belowski said.

“It’s really the public that really is pushing this through,” Belowski said. “It’s very nice of the mayor to listen to these meetings and what they came up with and put it into fruition.”

Belowski expects that the Board of Alders will support the proposal.

Earlier this week, two alders on the Finance Committee told the News they would need to closely examine the proposed staffing increases, though Alder Adam Marchand also praised Elicker for focusing on Parks. Last year, the Board rejected 25 of the 34 positions Elicker created, including four of the seven positions that would fall under a Parks Department.

Bombero told the News that she will help deliver the Parks presentation at upcoming budget hearings because the department does not currently have a director. She echoed Belowski’s belief that the public reaction will be favorable.

“As the inspiration for many of these changes came from the outreach and engagement process stewarded by URI, I anticipate that feedback will be positive,” she wrote.

FitzGerald also plans to attend the budget hearings, something she does every year.

Although members of ParksFriends plan to testify, the group has not yet decided whether they will present a collective objective, or have members speak individually about their own specific concerns.

“We have to get our act together and go over there and, and advocate for what’s important to us,” FitzGerald said.

The first of three public hearings on the budget will take place on Thursday, March 14.

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On Feb. 29, the joint Housing Committee approved legislation that would strengthen protections for renters facing eviction, prohibiting landlords from evicting their tenants without “just cause.” The bill, SB 143, would expand existing just cause protections, currently reserved for elderly and disabled tenants in buildings with five or more units, to almost all renters in the state. The fight for the bill has been spearheaded by Growing Together Connecticut, the Connecticut Tenants Union and Make the Road Connecticut, among other tenants’ rights and community organizations. 

“Many people within our urban communities [including] New Haven cannot even afford to rent, so they’re moving out of our city,” Rep. Juan Candelaria, the Deputy Speaker of the House who represents portions of Fair Haven and the Hill, told the News. “We need to control this.” 

Candelaria voiced his support for the bill, calling it “overdue.” He said that he sees SB 143 as a critical tool to address the affordable housing crisis and discriminatory housing practices in New Haven and around the state. In particular, Candelaria said he is concerned with protecting tenants from large “mega landlords” who often buy up rental properties from out-of-state. He told the News that he thinks evictions at the end of a lease without cause are far too frequent in Connecticut.

According to the Connecticut Fair Housing Center, landlords filed 2,224 no-cause eviction notices in 2023, around 11 percent of evictions statewide. In 2023, over 20,000 evictions were filed in the state, an approximately four percent increase from 2018. In New Haven alone, 1,769 evictions were filed in 2023, 240 without cause. 

Candelaria said that his office has received several messages from New Haven residents in support of the bill, which he committed to do, calling it “the right measure.”

Sen. Rob Sampson, ranking member of the Housing Committee and himself a landlord, raised several objections. He accused the Democratic caucus of discriminating against landlords, at one point equating the bill to racial and gender discrimination. 

“That’s all racism,” Sampson was quoted saying in the CT Mirror. “It’s been bad since the very first day that anyone judged anyone based on the color of their skin.” 

A related bill that would have capped annual rent increases at four percent plus inflation failed to pass the General Assembly last session after opposition from members of the Housing Committee. This session, the Senate Democratic caucus has added SB 143 to their list of legislative priorities

In conversation with the News, Candelaria pushed back on Sampson’s claims.

“If you’re going to increase rents, we’re not saying, ‘don’t increase them,’” he said. “Make sure those rents are fair and equitable so that we can manage the housing crisis in our cities. That’s all that we’re saying with this bill.” 

Tenant advocates support bill for low-income renters

Luke Melonakos-Harrison DIV ’23, Vice-President of CTU, also disagreed with Sampson’s claims, condemning the argument that landlords should face no regulation as ignoring the necessity of housing. He cited similar just cause legislation in several states and municipalities as evidence of its effectiveness and “positive impact” on housing stability and housing security.

“It’s a little bit hard to take seriously when you’re actually seeing what’s going on between tenants and landlords in real life and not in an abstract, theoretical debate,” he told the News.

Melonakos-Harrison did express concerns about the addition of a carve-out to the bill which exempts buildings with four units or less from the new regulations. The carve-out, he said, would reduce the bill’s effectiveness, confuse tenants about their eligibility, and play into the misconception that landlords of smaller buildings are less predatory. Instead, Melonakos-Harrison suggested, his organization might accept requirements based on the number of properties a landlord owns.

At the moment, CTU will continue advocating for the bill in Hartford.

“We’re focused on working with our members and our coalition partners across the state to reach out to their legislators and let them know how they feel about this bill and the importance of Just Cause,” Melonakos-Harrison said.

Teresa Quintana is the housing equity organizer for Make the Road Connecticut, an organization dedicated to providing legal assistance and support services for immigrant communities. 

Quintana said that immigrants, particularly those who are undocumented, are especially vulnerable to no-cause evictions.

“Many people in the undocumented community live that way because they trust,” she said. “They say, ‘Oh, they’re good landlords. We take care of the place,’ so they think [evictions are]  never going to happen… to them. And then it happens.”

According to Quintana, Make the Road Connecticut has collaborated with CTU and other organizations to encourage community members to testify in support of the bill.

She noted that immigrants are often reluctant to share their personal experiences with no-cause evictions, necessitating visits to their communities.

“When you’re going to tell [your] story, you’re going to feel that your soul is opening, because there’s a big, big scar,” she said, recalling her frequent words of encouragement to immigrants. “We’re going to expose how these people [are] taking advantage of you, your families.”

Melonakos-Harrison testified in support of the bill and helped organize members to do the same. He sees SB 143 as critical to preventing “gentrification” fueled by landlords evicting tenants to raise rents and preventing retaliatory eviction of “outspoken” tenants, especially tenant union supporters.

He said he is confident that the bill will help address the state’s affordable housing crisis by forcing landlords to negotiate with tenants, and limiting rent increases. SB 143 would provide tenants with “leverage” to negotiate a reasonable rent increase at the end of their lease, Melonakos-Harrison told the News.

“Lapse of time evictions are an easy tool for landlords who want to quell dissent, to kind of punish advocates and organizers and people who are even just requesting basic repairs,” Melonakos-Harrison said.

Landlords push back against proposed eviction protections

Rick Bush, a property manager and the treasurer of the Connecticut Coalition of Property Owners, testified in opposition to the bill at a public hearing on Feb. 20. 

Bush described lapse of time evictions as a “tool” for landlords, for example, if they need to remove a tenant to renovate their property.

“The idea that a tenant, once they take possession of a property, can stay in perpetuity is just completely ridiculous,” he told the News.

With the bill now moving on to the state assembly, Bush said he plans to keep lobbying against it and recruiting other members of the CCOPO to submit testimony in opposition.

CCOPO President John Souza is another landlord who testified against the bill.

Souza attributed tenants’ housing instability to the state affordable housing shortage, rather than lapse of time evictions. The National Low Income Housing Coalition estimates that there is a shortage of over 89,000 affordable rental homes for extremely low-income renters in Connecticut.

“Until they build a lot more housing, it’s really just musical chairs for everybody,” he said.

Currently, lapse of time evictions require landlords to provide tenants with a minimum of three days between receiving their eviction notice and vacating the property. 

However, Souza pointed out that tenants can contest such evictions, prompting a court process that lasts a few months. Tenants can also petition the court for additional stay for up to six months, providing them with extra time to find new housing.   

“I’m disappointed in the small-mindedness and short-sightedness of the legislators in Connecticut,” Bush said. “[Disappointed] that they… would fail to provide adequate housing for their constituents and that their vote is going to have the unintended consequence of making [renting property] more difficult, more expensive and less attractive to tenants. It’s going to be a disaster.”

The bill passed the Housing Committee along partisan lines. Candelaria said that he is optimistic that the bill will pass the legislature this session, most likely without any Republican support, but declined to speculate on whether Governor Ned Lamont would sign the bill into law.

Five states currently have some form of just cause eviction legislation.

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The budget proposal includes increased funding for education and housing and adds 31 new full-time positions to the city staff, including five housing inspectors. If approved, the budget will also reorganize New Haven housing programs and create a separate Parks Department.  

“He got it right this time … I like it,” Tom Goldenberg, a former mayoral challenger who had previously criticized Elicker’s fiscal year 2023-24  budget proposal, told the News. 

Goldenberg said that he supported the creation of a separate parks department, new housing inspection positions at the Livable City Initiative and a tax increase that is lower than last year’s, which is “encouraging.”

“We are pleased to see the increased investment in housing quality by adding needed positions at LCI,” Karen DuBois-Walton ’89, executive director of the New Haven Housing Authority, who challenged Elicker in the 2021 Democratic mayoral primary, wrote to the News. “Everyday we see the challenges families face seeking quality housing in the private market.” 

DuBois-Walton wrote that the decision to shift LCI’s focus away from housing development and toward inspections is a smart one. She also applauded the additional $300,000 allocated for the services for the unhoused.  

Leslie Blatteau, president of the New Haven Federation of Teachers, said that increased salaries, which account for a large part of the increased educational budget, allowed many teachers to stay teaching in New Haven Public Schools. She said that this has made them feel that they are “being compensated fairly.” 

Per the teachers union contract negotiated last year, the salaries of public school teachers are rising gradually over the three years following the contract. Blatteau said that the increases are especially significant for mid-career educators.

“We have to continue to make sure that as many dollars as possible are making it directly to the classroom,” Blatteau said. “That means making sure that we’re paying for highly qualified professionals to support our students and making sure that the resources are in place so that we can do our jobs.”

In Elicker’s budget proposal, an additional $5 million is allocated for the Board of Education. According to Elicker, the city is also hoping to get almost $4 million more from the state for schools. This funding goes to the city’s Board of Education, which then decides how to use it, Elicker said. 

Chris Schweitzer, the head of the New Haven Climate Movement, wrote to the News that he would love to hear more from the city about its environmental investments to reach the Climate Emergency Resolution goals.

“Later is too late for climate change action,” Schweitzer wrote. 

The Mayor’s budget proposal has to be approved by the Board of Alders, who will likely amend the proposal. 

Upon seeing the creation of over 30 new city employment positions allocated across various departments, Ward 25 Alder Adam Marchand told the News he will pay attention to the costs that are going to be used for the new workers’ salaries. 

“At this point, I don’t have a strong feeling one way or the other,” Marchand said. “I’ve done this long enough that I take my time with it. I generally form my opinions slowly over the course of the workshops when I get a better understanding from the department heads about what it is they’re proposing and why they want to do it.”

The Board of Alders will be holding three hearings and six workshops on the budget over the next six weeks to solicit community input.

Marchand commended the Mayor for allocating more funds to the Parks Department and for giving a lot of thought to the housing scarcity around New Haven. 

Ward 27 Alder and majority leader Richard Furlow echoed Marchand’s statement, saying that though he’s only looked at the highlights of the budget proposal so far, he will pay close attention to the new positions created.

“Thirty-one new positions, that’s a lot,” Furlow said. “But the budget process will be for each department to explain why they’re needed, and then we’ll decide what do we believe in.”

Last year, the Board rejected 25 out of the 34 positions Elicker created. 

Fiscal year 2024-25 will start on July 1.

Ariela Lopez contributed reporting.

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Among Lamont’s list of nominees are three Yale College graduates: Nicole Anker ’94, Tamar Birckhead ’87, and Alayna Stone ’04. The nominees will sit for hearings before the legislature’s Judiciary Committee, with their nominations subject to a vote in both chambers of the Connecticut General Assembly. Lamont’s selection of candidates was confined to a pool of individuals who had been interviewed and approved by the Judicial Selection Commission. 

The Connecticut Superior Court is a unified court system, comprising multiple sessions across the state’s 13 judicial districts, offering specialized courts for diverse cases such as major criminal, civil, family and juvenile matters, with each session having its own set of judges. 

“One of the most notable honors of my responsibilities as governor is to fill vacancies in our court system with capable jurists whose qualifications meet the high standards that the people of Connecticut deserve on the bench,” Lamont said. “This group of nominees I am forwarding to the legislature today continues this administration’s effort to ensure that the people who are serving as judges in our state reflect the diversity, experience and understanding of the people who live here.”

Nicole Anker ’94

Anker, who received her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Yale College, currently serves as the legal director for the Connecticut Department of Correction. With seventeen years of legal practice, she has specialized in both constitutional and employment law within the department. 

Before joining state service, Anker worked as a litigation and employment law associate at two prominent multinational law firms, namely Bingham McCutchen, LLP, and Brown, Raysman, Millstein, Felder, and Steiner, LLP.

Among the nominees to the Superior Court, Anker is one of 13 women and also one of two candidates from Glastonbury.

Anker received her law degree from the University of Connecticut School of Law in 1998.

Tamar Birckhead ’87

With 32 years of experience in law, Birckhead began her legal career as a public defender in Massachusetts before transitioning to academia at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Law. She served as a faculty member there, teaching law and directing clinical programs. Now operating as a solo practitioner at Birckhead Law LLC, she primarily represents indigent individuals in criminal and juvenile courts as appointed counsel. 

In the 2016-17 academic year, Birckhead served as a visiting clinical professor of law at Yale Law School where she supervised students in delinquency defense in the juvenile court in New Haven and taught a companion course. 

Like Anker, she is one of 13 women nominated to the Superior Court, and also stands as one of two nominees from Hartford.

Birckhead received her law degree from Harvard Law School in 1992.

Alayna Stone ’04

Stone holds a master’s degree from the Georgetown McCourt School of Public Policy and received her bachelor’s degree in psychology from Yale College. Currently serving as associate attorney general and chief of the Division of Civil Litigation at the Connecticut Office of the Attorney General, she oversees various sections including Employment, Workers’ Compensation and Labor, Health and Education, Public Safety and General Litigation. Before this role, she spent eight years as an assistant attorney general in the Special Litigation section, representing all branches of state government. 

Prior to joining the Attorney General’s Office, she clerked for two years at the Connecticut Superior Court, followed by one year each at the Connecticut Appellate Court under now-Chief Justice Richard A. Robinson and at the Connecticut Supreme Court under former Associate Justice Carmen E. Espinosa.

Similar to Anker and Birckhead, Stone is also one of the 13 women nominated and is one of two Black women among the nominees to the Superior Court. At 41, she also stands as one of the youngest nominees and is the only candidate from New Haven.

Stone received her law degree from the Georgetown University Law Center in 2010.

The significance of the court and its judges 

According to New Haven civil rights attorney Alex Taubes LAW ’15, the Superior Court is a court of general jurisdiction, meaning that it hears almost every type of case in the state, highlighting the relevance of the court in Connecticut’s legal disputes.

“All cases pretty much first get heard in the Superior Court,” Taubes told the News. “Other cases, either get appealed to the Superior Court or can be appealed from the Superior Court.”

Grace Brunner, a student at the University of Connecticut School of Law and leader of its chapter of the legal advocacy group People’s Parity Project, emphasized to the News the importance of diversity in backgrounds among Lamont’s judicial nominations.

She told the News that she thinks such selections bring “precisely the kind of experience” needed to positively impact Connecticut residents’ lives as the experiences of the judges can shape their decisions on the bench.

“I’m absolutely thrilled to hear that Governor Lamont has embraced the advocacy efforts of the CT Pro-People Judiciary Coalition, a group our chapter proudly stands behind,” Brunner wrote in a statement to the News. “The current makeup of the Connecticut bench favors former prosecutors and corporate lawyers, which overlooks the valuable perspectives of those with backgrounds in public defense, civil rights, and legal aid.”

The Superior Court bench currently has 35 vacancies.

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The elections marked the third time in seven months that New Haven voters reaffirmed their support for a Democratic apparatus allied with Yale’s UNITE HERE unions. Roughly 1,200 New Haven Democrats cast ballots at polling places amid Tuesday’s rain, handing party-backed candidates four times the number of votes earned by opponents running with the insurgent group New Haven Agenda.

“The candidates that we supported all had decisive and convincing victories,” said Vincent Mauro Jr., the Democratic Town Committee chairman. “It speaks to the faith and stability that the party has shown, along with its partnerships with labor and the Board of Alders.”

New Haven Agenda represented the first coordinated effort since 2012 to replace Democratic ward co-chairs, who vote to endorse party nominees and organize voters in their wards. The bloc of 12 candidates focused on criticizing UNITE HERE’s dominance in city politics and a host of neighborhood concerns.

Jason Bartlett, a defeated Ward 6 co-chair candidate who chaired the New Haven Agenda slate, acknowledged in an interview shortly before the polls closed that he and the other challengers faced tough prospects against an established party infrastructure spanning ward committees, City Hall and the State Capitol.

“You don’t have to win even one seat to start opening up the party to more people and putting your ideas on the table,” Bartlett said. “In terms of my personal objectives, part of it was just getting people to participate. That to me is a win.”

In recent weeks, candidates on both sides of the contest canvassed voters on the phone and in person, seeking support for elections that occur only infrequently, when more than two candidates qualify for the ballot. Elections took place in Wards 3, 4, 6, 7, 12, 18, 28 and 30, covering the Hill, parts of downtown and East Rock, Quinnipiac Meadows, East Shore, Beaver Hills and West Rock.

The incumbent co-chair slate, called Dems for Dems, celebrated its landslide wins at the AFL-CIO Central Labor Council building in Fair Haven with beers and cheers for co-chairs arriving from long days at their polling places. The gathering featured speeches by Mauro, Mayor Justin Elicker and Scott Marks, director of the union-affiliated organization New Haven Rising.

In his remarks, Mauro said complaints about undue influence wielded by UNITE HERE were “all horseshit” and touted the coalition — evident in the jubilant crowd — that critics say amounts to a political machine.

Leslie Radcliffe, a voter in the Hill and member of the Ward 4 Democratic committee, said she was impressed by the turnout, given the low-profile nature of co-chair roles. Ward 4 had over half the turnout Tuesday as in the mayoral general election in November.

“For a little known topic, a little known position, it did stir up some good trouble,” she said. “It was good that there were challengers and that there was attention brought to it.”

Radcliffe voted for her incumbent co-chairs, Jennifer Chona and Howard Boyd, but said she wished candidates on both slates had spoken more with residents.

Clarence Cummings, who won reelection as a Ward 3 co-chair, told the News that he met his two opponents, Inez Alvarez and Martha Dilone, for the first time at the polling place. He said he hopes they attend ward committee meetings going forward — a message echoed by other supporters of the victorious slate.

“Typically, you don’t have a lot of contested elections for ward co-chair,” Elicker said in an interview. “Bringing attention to that position is also important.”

The top vote-getter from in-person machine ballots on Tuesday was Gary Hogan of Ward 28, which covers most of Beaver Hills; he earned 252 votes.

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Two Democratic Town Committee co-chairs in each of the city’s 30 wards handle voter engagement and vote at party conventions on nominations for higher office. The election pits the current leadership, backed by Yale’s influential UNITE HERE unions, against a slate of challengers seeking to change the party’s direction.

The polls will be open from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. in Wards 3, 4, 6, 7, 12, 18, 28 and 30, which cover the Hill, parts of downtown and East Rock, Quinnipiac Meadows, East Shore, Beaver Hills and West Rock.

Why are the elections happening?

Most years, Democratic Town Committee ward co-chairs go uncontested. But a new group, New Haven Agenda, announced in January that it would seek to dislodge incumbent co-chairs. Some of the slate’s candidates failed to collect the required signatures or had paperwork rejected for technical reasons, but 12 qualified for the ballot.

The New Haven Agenda candidates, broadly dissatisfied with the city’s current government, have brought to the campaign a variety of concerns about their neighborhoods, such as speeding cars, uncontained trash, poorly paved streets and the expansion of Tweed-New Haven Airport. The incumbent slate defends the record of city politicians supported by UNITE HERE.

Who are the candidates?

Jason Bartlett, a Ward 6 co-chair contender who leads New Haven Agenda, has a long history in Connecticut politics. Most New Haven Agenda candidates, however, are residents with scant political experience.

They include an artist, a dancer, a former lawyer, a community activist, a restaurateur and a bookkeeper. Tom Goldenberg, the defeated 2023 Republican and Independent mayoral candidate, is the slate’s treasurer, but not a co-chair candidate.

The incumbent slate, formally called Dems for Dems, consists largely of members and allies of UNITE HERE unions, some involved in city government. Among the party-backed candidates in wards with contested elections are Ward 12 Alder Theresa Morant, former Ward 6 Alder Dolores Colon and Sean Matteson, Mayor Justin Elicker’s chief of staff.

How have they campaigned?

Candidates on both slates have called voters and knocked on doors in their neighborhoods. Both sides held campaign events on Saturday, Feb. 24, in the Hill, the neighborhood south of downtown where three contested elections are happening. A rally for the party-backed slate drew about 50 people, while about 20 people attended a New Haven Agenda meet-and-greet.

According to financial filings, Dems for Dems raised $4,370.34 in individual contributions between Feb. 7 and 25. In the same period, New Haven Agenda took in $1,794 from individuals, almost half from Bartlett. The slates have spent money on yard signs, flyers and online advertising.

New Haven Agenda released a video last week in which Bartlett criticized political spending by UNITE HERE. He called the unions a “special interest group” and said they lead local officials to neglect certain community issues such as education and public safety — a characterization challenged by union allies.

What are the stakes?

Victories for any New Haven Agenda candidates would signal that some New Haven Democrats are ready to consider alternatives to the union-backed power structure that has been in place for over a decade. Conversely, if candidates on the incumbent slate prevail, the election could solidify the city’s political status quo.

Some, such as Ward 4 co-chair contender Joe Fekieta and former Mayor John DeStefano Jr., see the New Haven Agenda effort as preparation for another mayoral campaign by Goldenberg in 2025. He has not announced plans to run.

Even still, it is not clear whether 12 Democratic ward co-chairs of the 60 across the city could significantly sway a mayoral campaign in favor of a primary challenger.

The next election in New Haven, Connecticut’s Democratic and Republican presidential primaries, will come on Tuesday, April 2.

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