New Haven Independent

Posted by: darnell | April 28, 2006 11:56 AM

I agree with Barbara Fair, less talk, more action. These aldermen have been sitting up in city hall for many years now, Jorge Perez has been there forever. He was the President of the Board, the second most powerful position in city government, behind the Mayor. What have they done all these years, absolutely nothing but talk.

Now they are talking about spliting the money between between these groups that they control. Come on, they don't have any foresight or imagination. The will take care of their friends and a whole alot of kids will be left out in the cold.

Tie the money to academic and attendance success, have the older kids working on community projects manageing the younger kids. We don't need a bunch of yalies coming in and being paid to "manage" our youth.

See http://www.newhavenindependent.org/archives/2006/03/ceta_redux.html, a new and innovative idea to rescue our youth.

Posted by: Lovebabz | April 28, 2006 3:33 PM

First of all, the City's youth initiative that the majority of my colleagues are working on is being spear-headed by those of us that are new to the BOA--or atleast going into our second terms. BOA President Carl Goldfield was right there from the first conversations about launching a real youth focused initiative. The thinking was that we need to allow neighborhoods to take an active role in addressing youth activities. We started with a small group of folks that included youth leadership from two of the most successful youth serving organizations in the City, LEAP and City-Wide Youth Coalition. To date we are working to ensure that this initiative will have a long and lasting run. It is easy to roll out some junk and offer it up as a youth initiative, but we didn't want to do that. I think there is a great deal of imagination at the table. I think we are looking at things in ways that allows for creativity and innovation. One of the coolest things about New Haven is the fact that we do have Yale University, SCSU, Albertus Magnus, UNH, and Gateway--these institutions of higher learning come with a whole lot of perks! Each doing their own thing to make a difference here in New Haven. What I find so tiring is this notion of one program fits all. Why not offer as many things as we can to engage youth. I have 4 very different children, each with their own talents and curiosities about the world. I want to cultivate those budding talents and curiosities. If I just had one place to take them, or one program to suit them all, then 1 or 2, or 3 or all may be bored or not interested or not tuned in. But a bigger dream is one in which all children could find something that suits them. We got to meet kids where they are. I beleive this initiative will do that. Don't Hate, Particpate!

Posted by: darnell | April 29, 2006 11:23 AM

The only thing I'm hating on is that 35% of our kids at Hillhouse (in your district) are not graduating from school, that 75% of our kids will not have jobs this summer, taht somehow all of you politicians seem to be the luckiest people on this planet, because you all seem to win the school lottery and get your kids into the best schools in the city. I'm hating that the Mayor had no fear to submit a budget to you with a 9% tax increase (which had several of his staff getting raises of $20,000+), yet no REAL substantial initiative to graduate our kids from school, or keep them off the streets during the summer. I'm hating that the kids who do manage to stay in school are scoring 50s and below in CAPT testing, the second lowest scores in the state out of 160 school districts. I'm hating that your "youth initiative" isn't really an initiative and doesn't have any imagination, all it does is rehash the same old formula, give money to your friends, who hire their friends, who keep voting for you. As the kids and parents said, all talk and no action. Where is the innovation? Why isn't this funding (which doesn't really exist yet, tied to good behavior and academic achievement? Why are educational administrators getting raises while our kids fail?

The problem is that there is no room made by you "leaders" for folks to participate. You guys think you know it all, and proceed to kill any new ideas, because they didn't come from you. Example, the governor proposes to eliminate car taxes, which the dems have been trying to do for years, CCM says that the city will benefit with an additional $500,000. What do you "leaders" do? You oppose the proposal, because it didn't come from you.

My reply to you is "don't hate, innovate".

Posted by: Lovebabz | May 2, 2006 11:09 AM

Hey I haven't attacked anyone--atleast in my mind--but then again this ain't the playground and the cussing part...well I love to cuss. There is something about bad words that I love--the fact that I can say them and say them with gusto is thrilling to me. But that is my quirky little deal. Anyway, Brother, keep the faith.

Posted by: darnell | May 2, 2006 9:33 PM

Hey, you keep on cussin' on, and Sister, I'll keep the faith as I know you are. Peace.

Posted by: JWolfson | May 3, 2006 2:28 PM

To Darnell, I just want to say that no Yalies are being paid for any of the work they do for the Roosevelt Instittuion. Our organization provides all our research for free. That's the main reason we were set up, because there's a lot of research going on in classes and on campus on issues that would be relevant to local and state politics, and we wanted to help get it there. A lot of politicians at local and state levels don't have money for research staff or access to information about the exact shape of problems in their community, which policies might address them best, or what other communities facing similar issues have done and with what results. Part of our hope in helping to organize this forum was to make sure that community youth, a prime source of info on what's affecting youth in the community, got a chance to convey their info to the local politicians in an organized and official format where they'd be listened to.

We're also not trying to come in and manage a community that knows far more about its strengths and weaknesses than we could hope to. Instead, we're trying to find a way to help information reach the people who need it, and to bring in other helpful information that isn't immediately accessible.

I know Yale as an institution has a rough history with New Haven, to put it nicely. While we as current Yale students aren't directly responsible for that, we are indirectly and we realize this. Many of us are trying to do what we can to make up for what was done in the past and to work towards a mutually beneficial relationship in the future, and I believe that the Roosevelt Institution's work is part of that.