Alders Vote To End Cuba Embargo

This is a waste of time and resources. We have far more important things to focus on in New Haven. While I understand the sentiment, it is still not acceptable to prioritize this type of work when we have so many higher priorities. The public sector needs to focus on fixing local issues, not on federal distractions like Cuba; also the federal government has more than enough resources to engage with Cuba and does not need the help of New Haven politicians who have trouble fixing their own issues.

New Haven has no democracy. The lock the Democratic party has on city govT makes our elected officials completely out of touch and unaccountable. Just ask yourself: can you name the last Republican to run against the Mayor? This grandstanding reminds me of when the BOA voted to oppose war with Iran. Really? Do they not understand the Constitution? Our kids are getting gunned down in their own backyards, police are routinely in the paper accused of you name it, pedestrians take their life into their hands when they dare cross a street. The pedestrian signals aren't user friendly on one way streets, and the user interface of the city is worse than the DMV, whether it comes to dealing with the Registrar of Voters or the Board of Education, or any dept. Schools are unsafe, and doctors are asserting that New Haven's noise levels are making children deaf early. Stores are still shuttered from the pandemic, but the BOA does not collaborate w/ the business community. Lucrative vacant lots polka dot the city, undeveloped, languishing. The lights on the New Haven Green - which sit sandwiched between Yale and City Hall, are on all day, every day, 24/7, broken. No one picks up a phone and calls the relevant department. If one calls an alder or city department, rather than getting on the horn and fixing the issue, the constituent gets a lengthy email about "initiating a conversation about equity..." about X. I am not kidding. "Initiating a conversation about equity of....broken parking meters."? Don't get me wrong, I'm to the left of Dems on many issues, but because we lack competitive elections IN MOST PARTS OF THE COUNTRY, most voters are disenfranchised, & government isn't responsive to the average Joe/Jane. Instead they engage in shenanigans like this vote on Cuba to distract from real issues and spice up their Twitter feeds w/ juicier Tweets. Tweets about parking meters & sidewalks = boring, but Cuba's a hit!

Surely soon, but perhaps at the next HVN BoE meeting,will be announced the new high school curriculum requirement: "Virtue Signalling". It will be taught by those visiting 'professors' HVN's board of alders, and both elected, and appointed BoE members, who know so much about practicing such.

Well, I was really hoping that the BOA could focus on important things like the city budget, long-term fiscal plans, growth plans in the city, etc...

...but instead we get a meaningless vote about Cuba.

How do we get better representatives? Is it by voting? Because every time I've voted here the same faces stay in power, locked in by the machine.

It's embarrassing how out of touch and broken the city 'leadership' is.

Shadow Boxer, you said it all. Virtue signal to distract us from the truly serious issues that affect us on a local level. It's so much easier to puff up chests and spout about foreign issues most know very little or nothing about.
TOMMYBRNFRD--- the best thing about virtue signalling is that you don't have to know how to read or write to do it!! The puts NHPS students in the perfect position to virtue signal and otherwise parrot what they are told to think and say !!!

If New Haven alders want to focus on foreign relations, may I suggest rather than obsessing over Cuba, which has basically had the same relationship with America since the Kennedy Administration, and is basically status quo for stability, that they focus on the far more pressing and unstable situations in Ukraine and the Middle East and North Africa, where there is dire need of humanitarian and economic support for the people who are suffering due to the invasions and wars and terrorism due to greed and lies from Russia and the Western countries over the last several decades meddling in their affairs.
Or maybe focus on the war at home against poverty, and hunger, and defending women’s rights, and LGBTQ+ rights, and defending voter’s rights, defending against gun violence, and to stand up against white supremacy and domestic terrorism and right wing extremism, and an attempted coup against the voters choice for the legally and fairly elected president, and so many other dire situations that we are facing as a nation and in our state and in our cities and towns right now, that are under attack and that threaten our lives, liberties, and pursuit of happiness. We have so many issues locally and nationally that we need to address, and we should get our house in order instead of attempting to influence other countries.

What a joke. These alders care more about communist Cuba than they do about New Haven.

This is really a cause for a vote???? How will the US and Cuba relationship help New Haven's problems? BOA fix our budget problems, improve our failing BOE, fix our NHPD. We have a lot to fix right here in New Haven. We don't need frivolous votes on non-New Haven issues. BOA, do your job; FIX New Haven's problems! SMFH

The vote was meaningless tokenism from the People’s Republic of New Haven. Regardless of how self important the Alders feel, foreign policy is entirely the purview of the Federal Government. Any local attention regarding the Cuban Embargo should be done through our local Congressmen and Senators.