Friends of Kensington Playground News

by Jane Comins, Friends of Kensington Playground

Easter Event: More than 80 children and their families attended our fun, festive event in Kensington Playground in April. Kids participated in an egg hunt, egg dyeing, making and decorating bonnets, free books, and received an Easter basket full of chocolate. Renee’s Closet was also in the park with a pop-up shop of clean, ready-to-wear clothing and jewelry.

Park Proposal: All Community Management Teams in the City of New Haven have approved a resolution calling on the Parks Department to adopt a policy that every neighborhood should have a public playground. We would like to publicly thank them.

Tax-Exempt Status: We are applying for 501(c)(3) status, with the assistance of the CT Urban Legal Initiative. (Although we incorporated in 2020 as a nonprofit organization, we did not apply for tax-exempt status at that time.)

Legal Update: As of mid-April, we are still awaiting the judge’s ruling regarding our March 9 hearing, in which the City asks the court to dismiss our CEPA (CT Environmental Protection Act) claim.

Learn More. Get Involved. Donate: We remain hopeful that our efforts will result in the city reclaiming/saving this valuable and irreplaceable neighborhood greenspace. Please visit our website to get involved, sign our petition, and donate toward our lawsuit to save Kensington Playground at: KensingtonPlayground.org and/or gofundme.com/f/save-kensington-playground
[Read the whole article at www.newhavenindependent.org/article/kensington_park_lawsuit]

Join the Gather New Haven Farm Based Wellness Program

The Gather New Haven Farm-Based Wellness Program is an intensive lifestyle intervention 16-week summer program that supports participants in achieving their nutrition and physical activity-related goals by meeting on a local urban farm within New Haven once a week for two hours from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. We engage in urban farming activities, we engage in group physical activities, we do a 10-minute mindful meditation and then move on to a nutrition discussion and a cooking demonstration which includes vegetables that participants are given to take home with them each week. On-site childcare is provided for participants with children. We also offer an additional Saturday session focused on physical activities from 9:30 to 11 a.m. The program is free, no cost to join.

The program aims to recruit participants within the New Haven area who have any diet-related disease (prediabetes, diabetes type 2, excess weight, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, etc) and are looking to make healthy lifestyle changes.

May 10-Sept. 3
Spanish on Tuesdays, 5:30-7:30 p.m. at 15 James St.
English on Thursdays, 5:30-7:30 p.m. at 170 Ward St.
Bilingual on Saturdays, 9:30-11 a.m. at 613 Ferry St.

For info and to register: 203-516-7270

Community Unity Dialogue Page

by Frank Panzarella, PAR Committee

The PAR Newsletter has always had as its mission the bringing together of activists by sharing reports of the events and ongoing work of groups to build a progressive community.

Sometimes we have received articles that are more like critiques of controversial issues that are important to particular groups but tended to emphasize differences within the progressive and broader community.

As we tend to focus on community unity and building a broad progressive constituency, we have rejected such articles and asked groups to send reports that show what groups are doing.

We recognize that within activist circles and the broader population there are many complex issues that can sometimes divide us and that require ongoing dialogue.

In this spirit, we would like to present a dialogue page in the PAR newsletter that will act as a place for groups to express differing views on controversial issues.

We would like this to be a page where groups focus specifically on their own positions on these issues, points of possible unity with others, and not as a place to criticize other groups or individuals with whom they disagree.

As an example, some activists see police violence as a reason to defund the police departments and to completely change the nature of “policing.” Others in our community feel the police are still necessary and look to other reforms. Discussions of such issues may help people find common ground and programmatic unity to further the causes dear to our hearts or at least to clarify differences.
Other examples, for instance, are the strong differing views on the war in Ukraine or the differing views on political violence in Syria.

We hope organizations will take up this offer and contact us with issues they would like to see on the dialogue page. The PAR committee looks forward to providing a forum for all to sort out controversial issues and build a stronger progressive family.

Construction Underway at Haven and Exchange Street

by savethesound.org

The construction of our current ecological restoration project at Haven and Exchange Street in Fair Haven is well underway and on schedule to be completed by the beginning of May.

Students from the John S. Martinez School explored the Haven and Exchange Street site.

One of the goals of this new green space is to filter and absorb polluted stormwater runoff from nearby streets before it reaches the Mill River. To restore the natural filtration process, we have removed the impervious asphalt and concrete surfaces in this dead-end roadway and have replaced them with porous sediment that has already seen a few rainfalls. Once construction is completed, we will open the site for volunteer planting events.

Students from the John S. Martinez School explored the Haven and Exchange Street site last month.
Students, families and the entire Fair Haven community will have the opportunity to help us plant native trees and shrubs in this space to absorb stormwater, restore and rehabilitate wildlife, and reconnect the community with the Mill River.

Fish are Running…But Not at Kinneytown

by savethesound.org

It’s officially spring, and migratory fish are making their way upstream to spawn. Some have been successful, like those in Whitford Brook, while others are encountering insurmountable barriers.

The spring fish run is an important time of year for diadromous fish that migrate from Long Island Sound into rivers throughout Connecticut and New York to their ancestral spawning grounds. Reproduction of fish such as alewife, blueback herring, and sea lamprey is important not only to sustain these species, but also to support populations of larger fish, birds, and mammals that rely on these “forage fish” for food.

Left photo -- The first alewife caught in traps between Whitford Pond and Long Pond. Middle photo -- Fish biologist, Jon Vander Werff holds an alewife. Right -- A school of alewife

The first alewife caught in traps between Whitford Pond and Long Pond (left). Fish biologist, Jon Vander Werff holds an alewife (middle). A school of alewife (right)

Dams and other barriers in our rivers hinder this important migration, and one of the largest culprits in the Long Island Sound region is Kinneytown Dam on the Naugatuck River. While a fishway was installed at this location, it has never been effective and has not even been opened yet this year by Hydroland, the dam owner. Their inability to pass the dam leaves fish stranded, forcing them to turn around or die from predation or exposure. Save the Sound’s Ecological Restoration team will be examining environmental DNA in the water at the base of the dam to understand which fish species are trying, and failing, to pass this barrier this year.

But it’s not all bad news. Whitford Brook has seen alewife make their way up through a natural breach in the Whitford Pond Dam to stretches of the river below Long Pond Dam (where Save the Sound is currently designing a nature-like fishway) for the first time in centuries.

“I’m so excited about this little fish—it is the first alewife documented that high in the watershed since before the construction of the Hyde Pond Dam,” says fish biologist Jon Vander Werff. “These fish are now able to reach habitat that hasn’t been accessible in hundreds of years, giving new life and new possibilities to the Whitford Brook diadromous fish run.” Save the Sound led the removal of Hyde Pond Dam in 2015.

“A Labor Of Love”: New Stetson Opens Its Doors on Dixwell Avenue

by Lucy Gelman, newhavenart.org, March 21, 2022

Two-year-old Tanner Carberry was parsing out the difference between a T-Rex, a Stegosaurus, and a Triceratops when Stetson Branch Manager Diane Brown made her way over to the table to get in on the action. A stack of books including Pride Colors, Planes Go, and Marvel’s illustrated Black Panther soaked in a patch of sunlight, waiting for Tanner’s attention. The dinosaurs had all of it.
“You read this?!” Brown said, running a ruby-tipped fingernail over the Triceratops’ yellow and gray head plate. Tanner nodded, a smile teasing at the edges of his mouth. Brown put out a fist and watched as he gave the gentlest bump in return.

Carberry and his grandmother, Dr. Belinda Carberry, were two of the first visitors to the new, two-story Stetson Branch Library Monday, as it opened its large front doors as an anchor of the Dixwell Avenue Q House. After years of anticipation, the space is officially open and ready for use. Brown said branch staff will hold an opening celebration June 4, as part of a larger festival outside the Q House.

“I’m a little tired but I’m happy,” Brown said during a momentary pause Monday, looking around an office that is still waiting for wall art. “I feel relieved. We finally got it opened to the public. It’s been a labor of love, but I would do this all again.”

[The Stetson is at 197 Dixwell Ave. Read the whole article: https://www.newhavenarts.org/arts-paper/articles/a-labor-of-love-stetson-reopens-its-doors-on-dixwell-avenue]

New Haven Climate Movement’s Electric Future Campaign

by Alex Murphy, NH Climate Movement

Multiple new and successful building projects—including the Hotel Marcel (named for Marcel Breuer’s brutalist architecture) and The Elm—have recently been completed in New Haven and point to the coming transition from fossil fuel to electric-based energy. These projects represent the idea of an “electric future,” and we as a community need to be implementing the same electric technology for everyday life—in our homes and cars—as well.

The New Haven Electric Future campaign is encouraging the transition away from fossil fuels to a community solely reliant on electricity—from electric cars to electric buildings—to reduce emissions, air pollution and noise, and to increase efficient energy use. Doing so is necessary for the health of the planet and our own.

A multitude of modern equipment continues to run on inefficient and unhealthy natural gas. Gas-powered technology—such as gas stoves and gas-powered cars—is everywhere, and many are unaware of the risks such devices pose. In order to reduce emissions, we need to switch as many systems as possible away from gas and onto the Connecticut grid, which continues to include more renewable energy sources. Zero-carbon and nuclear resources now make up nearly 65% of the electricity consumed, and that percentage is expected to increase to 91% by 2025. Electrification just makes sense.

Electrification is possible in any community that is committed to change, and early strides towards an electric future can serve as a framework for other locations. The recent passing of an electrification resolution by the Board of Alders in March of 2021 demonstrates an existent commitment to an electric future in New Haven, and it is the hope of the New Haven Climate Movement that prompt action in our community will serve as a guide.

What can I do? Share what you know with your family, friends, co-workers, landlords, and the like. Those in charge of energy allotment also need to know that electrical energy is the future, so share your concern with local elected officials and CT government members. The wide benefit that an electric future can bring to New Haven within the next few years is truly something to get excited about.

For more information, email us at newhavenclimatemovement@gmail.com. Our website is www.newhavenclimatemovement.org.

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