Nora Grace-Flood Photo
Ex-middle school, site of planned "art district"-community center.
Bookshelves, diapers, Covid-19 tests, ellipticals, chicken dinners, alternative education classrooms and paint palettes could all be available to all Hamden residents at a one-stop, no-charge shop — if a plan to build a brand new, Dixwell Q House-style community center in Southern Hamden moves forward.
The idea for the center was introduced by the Garrett Administration to Hamden’s Legislative Council Monday night as part of a presentation on how the town plans to allot roughly $18 million in remaining American Rescue Plan funds over the next four years.
Over at least the next two years, Mayor Lauren Garrett is looking to launch the beginning of an expanded community center on top of the town’s abandoned middle school at 560 Newhall St., to replace the Margaret L. Keefe Center housed on Pine Street.
The concept of a new community center, which was supported during two public input sessions held by the town about how to spend federal Covid-19 recovery money, is “the centerpiece” of a multi-part plan put forward by town officials to invest in Southern Hamden and “make sure we’re providing services that meet the needs of first and foremost our underserved populations in town, but also to everyone,” in the words of Chief of Staff Sean Grace.
The center would continue providing the same services offered by the Keefe Center, including a daycare, food pantry and community rooms. A commercial kitchen, fitness center, library branch, health clinic and classrooms are just a few fresh amenities the town is also looking to implement into the potential space — following on a model used in New Haven when the Dixwell Community “Q” House was rebuilt.
The Keefe Center's Sharon Jones dishes out baked beans during a community center barbecue — someday, she may be baking her own beans in a commercial kitchen.
Grace described it as an opportunity to grow the Keefe Center’s work and presence in town by expanding their facilities. For example, he said, a commercial kitchen will allow the Keefe Center to make their own meals in house and better address local food insecurity while simultaneously developing culinary training opportunities.
A bigger building could also mean classrooms for the students in Hamden’s alternative education program, known as the Hamden Collaborative Learning Center, which has never had a permanent home, as well as Board of Education offices for school administration. That would free up 60 Putnam Avenue, where the school superintendent currently works, for other town operations. Grace suggested the town may look into creating a mixed-use planned development district including shops and apartments on that property.
On Monday, the town council also approved two grant opportunities that the town will pursue in order to remediate flooding in the Newhall area as well as to create an “art district” next to the community center. (Read about that $8.5 million application from the Connecticut Department of Economic & Community Development to improve Newhall’s drainage system in the New Haven Register here.) The town will apply for $7.2 million in financial assistance from that same department in hopes of establishing an “arts district” that would include a performance space and visual arts gallery.
In efforts to make the neighborhood more walkable and the center maximally accessible, Grace said, the town would also look to install a spur trail connecting individuals to the Farmington Canal greenway, establish a bus stop on Newhall Street, and clean up the nearby Olin Powder Farm.
A tribute garden to the late 15-year-old, Elijah Gomez, who was killed on the Farmington Canal trail this spring, could be the last, low-cost addition to the area, according to Grace.
“I’m excited,” Justin Farmer, the representative of Hamden’s Fifth District, which includes the decaying middle school. “But I really am stressing communicating with the community about some of these concepts and ideas that will go into a Keefe Center 2.0 … Put the people closest to the problems closest to the solutions.”
Councilman Abdul Osmanu, who represents the Third Distrct, which includes the Keefe Center, agreed with Farmer: The community should also be consulted, he said, when deciding what will become of the current building if a Newhall center is developed.
Grace said the town must develop a concrete plan for the community center by 2024 and expend all funds by 2026 in order to stay in line with ARPA requirements. The first step in the process, he said, will be drafting a resolution to ascertain council support for the project before moving forward.
Grace assured that public input sessions will be organized to ask residents what they would specifically like to see made part of the center — and that the town would furthermore commit to hiring locally once the construction process is initiated.
“This can do a lot of good, a tremendous amount of good,” he said. “Some of these jobs will last for a year. Maybe we can get someone fresh out of high school, and by the time they’re done, they’re an electrician or a plumber. This could change the course of their life.”
Grace said he does not have an estimate as to how much the development may cost — but noted that the center’s many components could mean “many funding sources and partners.”
“When you go bigger, it gives you access to more sources of revenue. It makes the whole thing work — and it makes it a destination,” Grace said.
This seems like an extremely expensive idea. This building site is massive and a nice library branch doesn't need to take up all that much space. There's already a fantastic park a block away that has tons of community amenities.
Meanwhile rents and home prices are through the roof, because not enough new housing is being built in the New Haven area.
How about marketing the site to private developers as high-rise residential towers instead, with good connections to the walking/biking trail and transit, close to all the downtown jobs, with some nice food shops and community amenities (like a commercial kitchen or library branch) built into the basement or first floor?
It seems like building between 500 and 1,500 new tax-paying apartments and stores here, including 10-20% that are subsidized for low-income residents, might provide a greater benefit to the community than another expensive town office building would.