New Haven Independent: Promises Kept

Promises Kept

by Allan Appel | January 24, 2008 12:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

hanh-jan24%20004.JPG Check out Fairmont Heights, eight months — and a slew of housing authority promises — later.

Check out what Yolanda Cortez and Joseph McDuffie have to say. They both live in theses four-story public-housing low-rises tucked between Quinnipiac Avenue and the Ferry Street Bridge.

Cortez’s voice is rapid, accented in her native Spanish; McDuffie’s is calm, gentle, reassuringly unrushed, with echoes of the South Carolina he left 40 years ago to come live in New Haven. Yet they speak in the same voice about the positive changes that have recently come to their complex.

When the Independent visited at Fairmont Heights in late May (click here), residents praised the opportunities to garden and the relatively rural setting. But they bemoaned the conflicts, sometimes threatening, among tenants of a complex that mixed the elderly with those who were struggling with behavioral and drug problems.

nhi-A%26F%20and%20hanh%20005.JPG At that time, the complex had a property manager present. It also had a promise from Housing Authority of New Haven (HANH) Executive Director Jimmy Miller (at right in the picture, with HANH Commisioner Rev. Jason Turner) that as soon as the authority secured funds, counseling services of a serious and sufficient kind, which are expensive, would come to Fairmont.

The complex is also one which, he said, was slated to become “elderly only.” Younger people with problems disturbing the more tranquil life style sought by the elderly would be removed.

Some of those promises, though not all, seem to have been kept, and it’s making a difference.

Joseph McDuffie, who’s been at Fairmont for five years, is pleased with the results, and Cortez seems to be a part of the good news.

“All the people who were causing trouble,” McDuffie said, “the prostitutes and people using drugs, they are gone. No more fussing and fighting here. For those who live quietly here, the housing authority is doing a good job.”

Part of those changes relate to security. That’s where his neighbor Cortez comes in. She recently has been hired in an ongoing program, in coordination with Securitas, the firm HANH retains to provide supplemental security at the sites. Cortez is a BA, or building assistant, and is assigned shifts to cover the front desk at buildings that have a main entrance.

When visitors arrive, it’s her job to make sure the visitor signs in properlty.

Securitas was brought in by former HANH security chief John Prokop (who’s gone out to helm the city’s public works department department). It provides uniformed guards at fixed posts in HANH’s high-rises - as well as low-rises like Fairmont - and roving patrols in vehicles at the scatter site housing.

According to Karen DuBois-Walton, HANH’s chief operating officer, Cortez and the BAs also function as “the eyes and ears of a building and can alert our security personnel, HANH staff, and police to situations.”

Cortez is un-uniformed. Her shift is on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, from 1 to 4 p.m.. At 4., the uniformed Securitas guard arrives. Cortez relies on her relationships with her neighbors, and her common sense to solve problems. There are all kinds of signs up about procedures. “People must sign in their relatives or friends,” she said, referring to the perennial problem of unauthorized people entering the building.

“You see all the signs,” she said, pointing to pieces of paper tacked to various places on doors and walls reminding people to carry their key cards to open the door, and how the sign-in sheet must be observed.

Is it perfect? Absolutely not. Cortez said that her position is stressful. She said she has received very little training last month when she started, or since. She said she was looking forward to a meeting at HANH headquarters on Orange Street Thursday afternoon when Securitas is to evaluate the progress.

What would Cortez be bringing to the table there? She was reluctant to speak in earshot of some of the residents in the lobby. Nevertheless, she said she could benefit from more training. “And we also very much need a property manager on the premises. I mean what do we do in an emergency?”

It’s not clear how long a property manager has been absent from Fairmont, but it does seem to be one of Cortez’s chief concerns.

nhi-A%26F%20and%20hanh%20003.JPG AThe HANH Board of Commissioners (pictured, with chair Bob Solomon in the middle), on Tuesday authorized Securitas to add new officers, one at Ruoppolo Manor and one at Fairmont, and to maintain additional coverage. Guards, according to Dubois-Walton, are also stationed at Crawford Manor, William T. Rowe, Winslow-Celentano, Robert T. Wolfe, and Constance B. Motley complexes. The increase approved was $29,795, bringing the total contract amount since Securitas came on board in January 2007 to $428, 281; the contract runs through the end of February, 2008.

How this is going to effect Cortez is uncertain. She hopes to find out Thursday in the late afternoon when HANH staff and Securitas pow-wow. In the meantime, she continues to do her job, which she aptly describes as “looking after my neighbors.”

Dubois-Walton confirmed that Fairmont does not yet have the supportive services contract in place, which Miller had promised, although she was hopeful. “Given available funds, I would anticipate an RFP will be released soon to procure such services at Fairmont, William T. Rowe, and Crawford Manor.”

In the meantime, she and the rest of HANH working with people like Yolanda Cortez, have been doing something very right.

hanh-jan24%20005.JPG And McDuffie, who is the coordinator of the gardens at Fairmont Heights, was full of praise for the results. “The place is quiet and peaceful the way it’s supposed to be,” he said, “and the police, the New Haven police, come by every afternoon and ask us how things are going. I remember some months ago I was at a meeting down on Orange Street [HANH headquarters] about some of our problems here, and they said to me: ‘Mr. McDuffie, hang in there. You’ll all be at rest soon from some of these problems.’ I thought it was a joke. It wasn’t.”

Comments

Posted by: WEBblog 1 | January 24, 2008 4:38 PM

For god sakes Solomon, wake up Rev.Turner. He's missing the boat...er... the vote.

Posted by: Lyda Dixon | January 28, 2008 7:42 PM

Housing of Last Resort.
70-72 Fairmont Ave.

There are two building at Fairmont, 70 and 72. First I will comment on my reality and experience at 72 Fairmont.

Business goes on as usual, at 72 Fairmont. Josephine Dixon-Banks and myself Lyda Dixon are still being harassed by a tenant who lives on the second floor who think that we are walking back and forth in the apartment to harass him.

At all the meetings, that we have attended since 2004-2008, he still states that we are picking on him when we walk into our apartment. He admitted that he stacked his speakers up to the ceiling and turned his music up loud and left his apartment because we were making to much noise walking back and forth late at night. He had admitted in a meeting with our Lawyer and Housing Authority's Representative that" he was out to get "Josephine Dixon-Banks.

He admitted during third meeting with Community Mediation that he had stopped blasting his stereo, now he turns his television up loud after 11:00 and puts his earphones on when he is in the apartment and sometimes he leaves and goes to his girlfriends because" he can not stand to hears us walk across his floor". He admitted that he
Does not understand why we have to use the bathroom late at night because it disturbs him. So he turns up his television and leaves it on until 2:00 in the morning. He told the Director, his Lawyer and the Mediator the times that Josephine goes to the bathroom in the morning. He stated that he knows what time she closes the door to go to work in the morning. He listens and hears her take off her shoe at night and he knows the different sounds that she makes when she walks across the floor.

When his Attorney, kept patting him on the leg, trying to get him to calm down, he ignores him. In all of the meetings with all of these people he keeps showing them that he is extremely angry at Josephine.

He stated that "he uses the Security channels to watch her as she sits and reads in the lobby." He watches her on the monitor when she leaves for work, as she talks with other tenants. He stated that he does not have to wait in the lobby any more because he can watch her on the television. He stated that" he feels it is not normal for her to walk across his floor as much as she does". He doesn't believe that his behavior is irrational.

During meetings with Housing Authorities he acts out his anger and rage at Josephine.
When he acts out his threatening behavior they "beg him to stop." When he leaned forward across the table and points his finger in her face. They ignore him. At one meeting, with Housing Authority Representative he actually jumped up from his seat,
And pointed his finger at Josephine and told everyone in the room that he was going to get her. No one took his threats seriously.

Pg 2
When he screams as he walks the hall of 72 Fairmont that" he is going to get those two black women on the third floor" No one hears him. Until he's in their face screaming at them. Then maybe they will believe that his behavior is irrational.

Apparently neither does Community Mediation, Housing Authorities Representatives, Police Department of New Haven, Domestic Violence Organization, Elderly Services, Governors Office, State Representative Office, and all of the Organizations who have Partnered together too hold women of color imprisoned as irrational men terrorize them.

It is good that two residents who live in building 70 are feeling safe and secure but some are frighten when a tenant decided to walk the hall and scream that "he feel like killing some one to-day."

In building 72, business goes on as usual. The prostitutes are still working while the Housing Court determines their plight. The Madame is still pretending that her cousins are visiting and she is the boss up there and no one has the right to speak without her consent.

The Security Guard was the latest casualty. She slipped and fell and damaged her leg. It happened when the ceiling started to leak and sewage flooded the entrance.
The Security guard telephoned Housing. No one responded. The other Security guard from building 70 came across and telephoned Housing. No one came. People were
walking, through sewage trying to get to their apartments. Sewage leaked from the ceiling into the lights then onto the floor. I telephoned, Housing Authority and left a message with the Answering Service person. I kept telling her that the ceiling was leaking and that water had accumulated in the lights. She stated that she would leave a message for Housing. No one came.

On Dec. 24, 2007, a neighbor on the third floor apartment flooded. She asked me if I could help her. I went to her apartment, she had bubbles in her walls where the water had accumulated. There was water in her electric stove. She showed me where water was leaking on too her cereal boxes, so she had to throw them away. She took me to her bathroom and showed me where water was leaking into the her bathroom.

She stated that someone from Housing had been there and they shut her heat off because of the water leak but they gave her a heater.

Business goes on as Usual.
Lyda Dixon of 72 Fairmo

Posted by: Chris Gray | February 1, 2008 1:40 AM

So far in my tenancy (since late May), I have yet to fully and fairly judge the operation of the complex.

I live at 70 Fairmont and have had no problems with neighbors and only minor hassles with the bureaucracy (such as figuring out how to report a leak from the apartment above me into my bathroom or arranging to get new keys when they changed the locks November 9th; I couldn't get back in until Thanksgiving Eve).

An on-site property manager (who responded when the office doorbell or telephone rang) and supportive services (especially some conflict resolution services for Ms. Dixon, Ms. Dixon-Banks and their neighbor, apparently) would be well advised but, I must say, things already do seem a bit improved since May.

At that point security was already in place, so I suspect that the lock changing was a crucial further move.

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