“Separated by Design” - CT and affordable housing

“Separated by Design: How Some of America’s Richest Towns Fight Affordable Housing”, by Jacqueline Rabe Thomas via ProPublica and The Connecticut Mirror.

This article is from May 2019, and I only recently came across it and read it. Connecticut is my home state. Though I was born in Massachussets, we moved to CT after my dad passed away, and I started 1st grade in CT. I grew up in CT and attended college in CT as well - UConn, baby! CT is snobby and segregated, and I feel like this article interviewed people I know or have spent time with.

CT is a great place to raise a family and that’s because of the state’s wonderful school systems. CT boasts a number of the wealthiest towns in the country (Greenwich, New Canaan…), as well as a number of the poorest cities (Hartford, Bridgeport, New Haven, well not the Yale side). CT is so snobby that while some “towns” are populous enough to be considered “cities”, they are still denoted as “towns”; see “The Town of Greenwich”. It’s a despicable contrast.

And for what it’s worth, plenty of parents in my CT hometown commuted 40/50 miles, one way, to New York City for work.

[Full disclosure - my biggest complaint about my now-home state, Colorado, and the area where I live is how white it is. So, “it’s easy to throw stones…”]

This article is a trip and worth the read and below are some choice excerpts and my commentary.

“[Former Governor] Malloy, now a visiting professor at Boston College, explained in an interview why such a large share of affordable housing that opened during his tenure was in the poorest neighborhoods.

“You build where you can, where a community is inviting,” he said. “I do believe that there is not an openness and willingness to have the people who work in town, live in town. Maybe that’s because some towns want everyone to be the same. I don’t know why a town wouldn’t want a fireman or a policeman or a day care worker who works in their community to be able to live in that community.”

Although the article’s focus is not on Governor Malloy, but SIR, you are a former government official teaching what you learned on the job at a fancy, private, jesuit school in another g.d. state. Why not UConn? Why not Southern Connecticut State University? It’s clear CT and those of privilege love the optics of caring about their state. Nonetheless, Governor Malloy redeems himself later in the article, saying explicitly that CT communities just don’t want poor people in “their” towns. B/c CT folks are just that snobby that “poor” means “black” to them. But yeah, Malloy - dude - spare me.

Keep reading, it gets worse.

In 2001, the town paid $4.2 million to purchase a 4-acre property adjacent to a local elementary school where only 5% of the students come from low-income families. The developer had planned to develop 60 units, of which 15 would have been dedicated for poor residents. The land is now a community garden and parking lot.

Several years later, the town’s first selectman reached out to several potential buyers to facilitate the $14.5 million purchase of another property where the owner wanted to build 200 apartments by replacing a local hotel, the Westport Inn. Sixty of the units would have been for poor residents.

A hotel remains there today.

Oh, phew, kale and chicory has a spot.

Occasionally, residents voice fear of the type of people they believe affordable housing will bring.

THE TYPE OF PEOPLE.

Do not fret, it gets worse!

“The drug addicts are going to be here, believe me,” William Woermer, of Branford, testified in November 2017 about a proposal to demolish a 50-unit, run-down low-income housing project for seniors and replace it with 67 units for poor families. “Retirees, disabled, old people — I have no objection to renovate the whole place and make it nice for them. But don’t get too much of that riffraff in. There will be a lot of riffraff. Then we go onto, with a project like this, you need security guards in the area.” Woermer did not respond to an interview request.

In Greenwich, a public hearing in August 2017 about plans for an apartment complex next to the town’s commuter train station quickly devolved into residents complaining that low-income residents wouldn’t be able to afford to shop locally. “Nobody goes to our restaurants [if you’re] living in affordable housing,” Adam Tooter, a resident who had recently bought a $1.5 million home, said during the August hearing. Tooter did not respond to messages.

Gayle DePoli, another local resident, said: “Those people won’t be able to afford to live in Old Greenwich. They won’t be able to afford to shop in King’s [gourmet grocery store]. They won’t be able to afford to eat in any restaurant but Dunkin’ Donuts and maybe grab a slice at Arcadia Pizza. They won’t even be able to afford getting a scoop of ice cream at Darlene’s.”

During a recent interview, DePoli said she is opposed to the development because the area is already too congested and it is unfair to have poor people living in such high-cost areas.

“It’s not about not in my neighborhood. It’s: enough in my area. It’s overbuilt with condos,” said DePoli, an independent contractor for media companies in Manhattan. “Your heart’s got to bleed a little bit for people that need low-income housing, and then you are going to put them in the middle of something they can’t afford. They can afford the rent, but what else? They aren’t going to the restaurants down there. Everything they can afford [is a car or bus ride] away. It’s pretty sad.”

Ya you sound just fkn devastated!!!! “Sorry to those people, since you’re poor, but I am opposed to giving or supporting opportunities for security and stability. Anyway, is my ‘No Kids in Cages’ bumper sticker on straight?! Thx, doll!!”

Also, DiPoli: you don’t even go here!!! You work in Manhattan, where I’m sure you as racist there, too. (Who knows how any of these quotes folks’ life may have changed due to the pandemic. But…wow, ya’ll.)

I’d like to also use this opportunity, and any opportunity I can, to point out that alcohol is a drug, it is served just about everywhere, including fancy restaurants that also serve - I’m guessing - locally grown kale and chicory, along with y’all’s drugs of choice: booze. (Make no mistake, I do not practice sobriety, and I also don’t lie to myself about my substance habits.)

He facilitated the purchase of the Westport Inn because it’s the town’s only hotel outside a 12-room inn on the Long Island Sound, he explained.

“When we have had serious storms, the Westport Inn was the one place we could offer somewhat permanent shelter,” he said. “I believe there is a need for that as well. That was the motivating factor in my mind.”

Uhhhh…..So……you’re good with the photo op. / Internet act of providing shelter during storms, but not say, on regular time?! I wonder if they gave out this t-shirt during those storms (They didn’t. And please don’t buy that shirt.)

For shame, CT. And on all of us. Affordable housing (and healthcare, roads FFS, nutritious food) isn’t some huge mystery of a system to implement. I know I ranked on kale earlier, but that metaphorical kale in that part of the story isn’t going to anyone beyond that township, which is the entire point. Food, shelter, clean/safe living are basic needs. I’m quite done with corporate welfare in the United States. Accounting is an art, but the money is there to fund all of this, every last bit. I love the idea that “taxation is theft” as the next person, however, I like roads, the Ayn Rand fantasy is umm not coming, girl, and it’s time we took care of each other.