Primary Issue: Showing Up

Like Donald Trump, Richard Spears said he is not part of the political ​“establishment” — unlike his opponent.

That opponent, Gerald Antunes said, he is emerging from political retirement because unlike with Donald Trump, the public can’t find Richard Spears.

One recent afternoon, Spears was at 91 Diner on Middletown Avenue, arguing that his poor attendance record at Board of Alders meetings was not as important as his strong record of community action.

A few days earlier, Antunes, a retired police captain, was in a booth at the very same diner explaining how his history of service as past Quinnpiac Meadows alder and city cop means neighbors should vote him in for a fourth term.

Antunes and Spears are competing for Quinnipiac Meadows/Bishop Woods Ward 12 Board of Alders seat in one of eight Democratic primaries to be held Sept. 16.

Neighbors have complained that they ​“don’t know who the current alder is and have no contact with him,” Antunes said. So he dusted off his hat and threw it in the ring. A three-term alder who stepped down in 2011, Antunes said he aims to make the sprawling ward, which borders both North Haven and East Haven, more cohesive.

He started canvassing a few weeks ago and goes out to talk to people ​“almost daily,” he said. Quinnipiac Meadows has been redistricted since he was alder — the section bordered by Eastern Street and Quinnipiac Avenue was once in a different ward. ​“It’s a whole area that doesn’t know me” as alder, Antunes said. He said as he introduces himself, some recognize his name, even if he never represented them.

Spears said he needs another term to finish the work he started. But he doesn’t necessarily plan to go to more Board of Alders meetings. ​“Ward business takes place in the neighborhood, not downtown,” he said.

Spears has been to 70 percent of full Board of Alders meetings, making him the alder with the second worst attendance record, after West Rock Alder Carlton Staggers’ 65 percent record. Spears in 2014 attended only 24 percent of his assigned alder committee meetings (where much of the work on legislation often gets done); at last count his 2015 committee attendance had plummeted to 11 percent.

A counselor and teacher, Spears received a promotion at work and ​“had to take a back seat to some of the evening meetings,” he said. He said he makes attendance at monthly management team meetings and block watch meetings a priority.

“They’re more important to me, because those are the people,” he said.

When the Quinnipiac East Management Team received $10,000 from the city, he worked with members to to put that money toward a bus shelter on Foxon Road.

Both Antunes and Spears were placed on the board of the Solid Waste & Recycle Authority as Ward 12 alder. Antunes stayed on the board after retiring from City Hall. Spears has not attended many of the board’s meetings.

Spears said he would attend more committee meetings if Board of Alders leadership granted his requests to sit on important committees such as Finance or Public Safety. ​“They put me on remote committees” like sewage and waste, he said. ​“That’s not something that’s going to impact on a daily basis. What we’re doing is business as usual.”

Antunes said that a challenge of being alder is learning to balance fighting for one’s specific ward with fighting for the needs of the whole city. ​“Sometimes it means giving money to a ward that needs it a little more than you do,” he said.

“Different parts of the ward have different issues,” including lack of police presence and speeding traffic on major avenues, Antunes said. Ward 12 includes portions of three bustling thoroughfares: Route 80, Middletown Avenue and Quinnipiac Avenue.

A major problem in the ward: torn-up infrastructure. Many streets in the somewhat rural neighborhood don’t have sidewalks and the roads are filled with potholes. Antunes said he has been trying to get streets repaved since 2005, but they’ve been on a city wait list since then. He oversaw an experimental paving process for some streets, where a layer of asphalt was placed over the existing road and last about five years.

In the past couple of years, Spears said he has been trying to get the city to fix a pothole-ridden section of Oak Ridge Drive, to no avail. He did work with the not-for-profit Urban Resource Initiative to clean up a blighted patch of land at the corner of Avenue and Eastern Street and put a welcome sign to the neighborhood there instead.

“Sweat equity in this neighborhood is more important than talk,” he said. ​“People used to park cars and do drug deals there. Now at least it looks like something,” he said.

Dave Tobin (pictured at right in photo with Spears) lives half a block away from the sign on Quinnipiac Avenue, where cars speed down the residential street and hydroplane into local fences. ​“Watch them plow down this street,” he said, as traffic zoomed by.

Spears said that although he doesn’t think he can get much done downtown, he wants to be reelected as alder. Why not become a community organizer and eschew the meetings altogether? He said he can use his position as alder to lobby new Board of Alders President Tyisha Walker ​“to try to get on a committee that makes sense to my neighborhood.”

Antunes said it’s important to ​“make sure the community is represented downtown,” in part by having an alder regularly speak on Quinnipiac Meadows neighbors’ behalf at Board of Alders meetings.

Antunes said he is accustomed to responding to people’s problems in large volume from his police days. ​“You get used to that in law enforcement because people call you for anything and everything,” often last minute, he said. ​“In police work, you’re 75 percent social worker and 25 percent cop.”

Both candidates support an existing plan to split the ward into two policing districts because it is too big for effective community policing. The city is is the process of redrawing district boundaries with that change in mind.

Previous coverage of the Sept. 16 Democratic alder primaries:
• Lee Throws Down An Anti-Union Gauntlet
• Hines To Ward 20: Your Voice Matters
• Marks Promises New Leadership
• Local 34 Endorses 6 For Alder
• Berrios-Bones: Stay The Course
• Burwell Confronts Language Barrier
• Robinson-Thorpe Ready For Primary Fight
• 8 Primaries On Tap
• Newhallville Gets A Primary
• Clyburn: ​“A Voice At The Table”