Paul Bass Photo
On the basketball court kids from the McConaughy Terrace projects donned team shirts to start off the second year of a community league. On the sidelines Carlton Staggers donned a blue team T‑shirt of his own — and announced he’s ready to hit the pavement for a second quest for public office.
Staggers’ shirt read “Team Carlton” on the front. The back had the number 30 — for Ward 30, the bifurcated political district that covers the West Rock neighborhood on one side of West Rock, the West Hills neighborhood on the other.
Staggers had the shirt made up two years ago when he ran for Ward 30 alderman, and lost, against Darnell Goldson.
Sunday he put it back on because he has decided to run against Goldson again, in a Sept. 13 Democratic Party primary. He said the action taking place on the basketball court at South Genesse Park pushed him back into the political game.
“Look at the kids,” Staggers said. “They have no benches. No place to sit down. No water fountain. Why is no one [in government or the city at large] helping them?”
Community volunteers started the league last summer. They reprised it this summer. Neighbors and local businesses pay for jerseys, for hot dogs and hamburgers for the kids. Volunteers coach and organize the kids. Over 100 kids from the neighborhood and their friends, ages 10 to 15, signed up this year. Sunday was the first official week of play; the league runs on Sundays through August.
The previous Sunday the crew turned out for scrimmages. Staggers, who grew up and still lives around the corner on Harper Avenue, stopped by. He had coached in an earlier iteration of the league years back. Now some of the people he coached as kids were helping to run the show.
Redding, Staggers & Jackson.
People like Kenneth Redding, who now works at L’s Barber Shop on Whalley and financially supports the league with barber shop owner Leon Jackson.
Old friends like Jackson and Redding urged Staggers to try again for alderman, Staggers said. So even though the ward committee had already met to endorse a candidate, he decided to take the plunge.
His goal: to use the position to get support for kids’ programs like the basketball league, to push for more after-school programs, and to link parents and people leaving prison, among others, to help and opportunities they might not know about in town. He’d like to see lights placed on Augustine Field so the championship Steelers youth team on the other side of the Rock can play at night.
For instance, Staggers said, he loves the new Promise program offering free college scholarships to qualifying public-school kids. “But some of the parents don’t know about it. Someone has to tell them.”
The public schools in general have made progress, he said. He spoke of new SAT prep and other programs at Hillhouse High School, where his son Corey is a rising junior. “[Principal] Kermit [Carolina] is doing a great job” at the school, Staggers said.
Staggers, who’s 44 and works with disabled people at Marrackech and Ben Haven, said he doesn’t yet have a position on some citywide issues like this year’s failed attempt to create a stormwater authority or whether municipal unions should agree to health care or pension givebacks. He said he’s eager to “get more information” on those issues and tackle them.
Incumbent Darnell Goldson has carved a spot as a leading City Hall critic on many of those citywide issues — one reason City Hall staffers and supporters could be found two years ago flooding into West Rock and West Hills on Democratic primary day to try to help Staggers beat him.
“I know it’s going to come up,” Staggers offered Sunday. “They [City Hall and party leaders] didn’t force me to do this [campaign]. My friends forced me to do this. I was raised out here; everybody knows me out here. I’m a people person.”
His campaign won’t include criticisms of Goldson, Staggers said. “I guess he’s doing fine. Me and Darnell are friends. He’s married to my wife’s cousin. I’m not saying he’s doing a bad job or a good job. I think I can do a better job. I know a lot of people; a lot of people know me.”
“I always predicted the mayor would find someone to run against me. I have a record here I’m going to run on. If I can’t beat Carlton Staggers based on my record, I guess I’m not doing the right thing,” Goldson said later Sunday.
Goldson said he believes he has built up more support in the ward since the last election: “I was out there shoveling [neighbors’] cars in the snowstorm. I was defending them against tax raises. During this summer I was advocating for more money for youth programs. I think I have a strong record to run on.”
Last time Ward 30 Democratic Co-Chair Honda Smith served as Goldson’s campaign manager. Not this time.
Smith (pictured at Sunday’s league games) said she’ll vote to endorse Goldson at Tuesday night’s city Democratic convention, since he was the only one who showed up at the July 6 ward nominating meeting and received the ward committee’s endorsement. But she’s staying out of the race after that. “I’m very neutral,” Smith said. “I love both of these guys. The community has the last say.”
“It’s a rerun,” she said of the race. “It’s going to be a real fight.”
Distract the masses with basketball games and hotdogs. Perhaps then they will forget about the fleecing of their tax dollars by the "leaders" downtown. Did he ever approach Goldson about lights on Augustine Field? So he likes Promise to New Haven and the work Carolina is doing .... who doesn't?
While he is proposing basketball games, Goldson is proposing HIRE New Haven, a public private partnership to put people to work. While he is giving away hotdogs, Goldson is downtown fighting the million dollar giveaways to Yale University. While he is belatedly suggesting lights on Augustine field, Goldson fought and stopped the relocation of an outdoor shooting range across the street from the field.
He ran a year and a half ago, but hasn't even kept in touch with what is happening in the city (Staggers...said he doesn't yet have a position on some citywide issues like this year's failed attempt to create a stormwater authority or whether municipal unions should agree to health care or pension givebacks. He said he's eager to "get more information" on those issues and tackle them).
This election shouldn't even be a contest, unless of course it comes down to who gives away the most hotdogs at a basketball game.
And one last thing, what in the "h" "e" "double hockey sticks" did Honda get to switch sides? First she guarantees the ward nomination for DeStefano, then she betrays Goldson. Could it have something to do with the fact that her street was paved last week? ...