New Haven Independent

City Hall organized the party Thursday to honor teens who have made a difference this summer working with not-for-profit organizations.

City Youth Department chief Che Dawson got the idea from readers commenting on this July 31 article in the New Haven Independent. The article told the story of Norman Boone and other at-risk teens — i.e., troublemakers — who’ve been steered straight over the past year by the new Street Outreach Workers program. In a summer marked by shootings by youths and the group beating of a van driver in Newhallville, readers were looking to shift attention to the many teens who are doing good and doing right in New Haven.

One young woman doing good here this summer — Elise Schoenfeld (at left in photo), a rising Harvard senior who’s interning at City Hall — and Che Dawson (at right) went about putting the readers’ idea into action.

They solicited names of top teens from not-for-profit groups. They and other staffers collected 28 pies donated by local pizza joints. They put tables on the Green, a bandstand with mics, then served the pie and hosted some teens’ original rap numbers from noon to 2 p.m. (Pictured: The evidence that all 28 pies were needed.)

Between 75 and 100 people turned out for the feast. Some were the honored teens and their friends, others civic leaders, some semi-permanent residents of the Green. Tatiana Boone (pictured), 10, came along with her 17-year-old aunt Isabella Edwards (who’s pictured at the top of this story). Isabella, who lives on Central Avenue in Westville, is a rising Hillhouse senior. This summer she volunteered with organizers of a block party in Dwight. She also went to D.C. for an American Athletic Union (AAU) basketball tournament; she plays point guard and shooting guard. Isabella hopes to become “a psychologist at a juvenile detention center. Since I was 10, people would come to me with their problems. I would give them encouragement and tell them whoat’s right and wrong.”

A table of sudents from Coop High School’s visual arts program (including, pictured from left, Sharlyce Boone, Brittney Murray and Timothy McClure) spent the summer making public service announcements for the mayor’s teen pregnancy task force. The tag line to their videos: “It’s your responsibility.”

Mayor John DeStefano picked up on that slogan in remarks to the gathering. “Keep making good choices,” he urged the teens. He hung out at the various tables, joking with the honorees and learning about their work. At one table (pictured) he heard about teens conducting a door-to-door survey on behalf of the Dwight Management Team (one of two such efforts in town this summer).

A team from the United Way, which nominated teens from Solar Youth and Youth Rights Media, was on hand with black-and-white “Live United” T-shirts…

… with which the pizza-fed crowd was outfitted. The day’s message was unmistakable. “It’s very easy to do the wrong thing,” Che Dawson said in remarks from the stage. “You all have been doing the right thing.”

“This is the community,” Dawson said offstage, referring to the event itself. “The community wanted us to do this. Usually if there is something negative, we’ll hear about it. This is a testament to New Haven — the willingness to support young people.”