Hundreds Rally For Yale Contribution

Nearly one thousand people rallied beneath the sweltering sun Tuesday evening to send a resounding message to Yale University: that as research funding cuts take effect and a substantial endowment tax looms, now is the time to invest further in New Haven — not to retreat or withhold.

Affiliates and allies of New Haven Rising, the economic justice advocacy partner of New Haven’s UNITE HERE unions, filled Scantlebury Park in the 93-degree weather to call on the university to contribute more funding to New Haven.

Yale is facing an 8 percent endowment tax passed recently by Congress. In a July statement, Yale President Maurie McInnis wrote, ​“This is money that would otherwise support our students, faculty, staff, and local partnerships with the city of New Haven.”

On Tuesday, activists maintained that lost or threatened funding does not absolve the university from an obligation to contribute more to New Haven. 

“Even in a moment of great funding cuts,” said New Haven Rising organizer Abby Feldman, ​“there is more than enough to go around.” She pointed out that the institution with an endowment amounting to more than $41 billion has raised over $6 billion in its ongoing ​“For Humanity” fundraising campaign alone. 

Attendees included hundreds of members of UNITE HERE Locals 33, 34, 35, and 217; a dozen New Haven Public Schools educators; a wide range of activist organizations advocating for tenant power, immigrant protections, climate interventions, and transgender rights; and politicians ranging from the mayor to state representatives to many members of the Board of Alders.

Over the course of an hour and a half, attendees called for more funding to address a wide range of needs in New Haven, including more affordable housing, more jobs that pay a livable wage, broader access to healthcare, and safer neighborhoods.

They cheered, raised signs, guzzled water, and at times found the energy to dance in the blistering heat.

Tuesday’s rally took place as a six-year, city-Yale deal announced in November 2021 and approved by the Board of Alders in April 2022 enters its final years. That agreement saw Yale commit to increasing its voluntary payments to New Haven by $10 million per year during the first five years of the deal, and by $2 million in the sixth year. It also saw Yale dedicate $5 million to create a new Center for Inclusive Growth, agree to a phase-out property tax-payment schedule for properties Yale acquires and takes off the tax rolls, and commit to converting a portion of High Street downtown to a pedestrian and bicycle-only plaza. (Yale has subsequently paused that last endeavor amid uncertainty around federal funding under the Trump administration.)

Local refugee advocate Jane Kinity said she stumbled upon the protest while on break at her job at Yale’s nearby student health center on Ashmun Street. Spotting several hundreds of people filling the nearby park, Kinity wondered ​“what was going on” — then learned that New Haven Rising was advocating for Yale to contribute more funds to the city. A proud Local 35 member, Kinity said, she decided to spend her break amongst the crowd. 

“We have youth in the community” who need more resources, she said.

New Haven Federation of Teachers President Leslie Blatteau reported that ​“only 8 percent of our members believe we have enough staff” in New Haven Public Schools, and ​“only 10 percent of our staff” believe they are sufficiently compensated for their work.

“The state of Connecticut has extreme wealth. Yale University has extreme wealth,” she said. She called on the state, Yale, and the ​“14 billionaires” living in Connecticut to redistribute some of their resources to public schools and to the people struggling the most. ​“Working people built this nation,” she declared to resounding cheers from the crowd.

High School in the Community student Jonaily Colon, who is one of the two student representatives on the Board of Education, said that when she and her classmates return to school this fall, ​“We will see a devastating change. Many electives we have in our schools will no longer exist. Our class sizes will increase. … We will be facing new challenges as our classrooms continue to get hotter and the mold continues to become hazardous to our health.” 

She sketched a vision of the future in which ​“our fully funded schools will have basic school supplies” with well-resourced art and music education. ​“Our fully-funded schools in the future won’t have leaky roofs and moldy classrooms. They will be welcoming and well-maintained,” said Colon. ​“We won’t have to worry about our teacher finding a trash can or bucket to collect the water or numerous puddles in our school.”

These words resonated with several of the current high school students or recent graduates who attended the rally.

Reily Hosten, a student at the state’s Eli Whitney Technical High School in Hamden, noted that ​“my school was in danger of not having funding for summer school.”

Recent Wilbur Cross graduate Jordell Wynn recalled, ​“At Wilbur Cross, we suffered leaks in the ceilings, mold in the classrooms.” 

He recalled attending classes at Yale through the university’s Shafer Scholars program for New Haven high school students, and noticing a stark difference in the quality and safety of the university classrooms compared to those in his school.

Meanwhile, another loss that Colon fears her classmates may encounter this fall is the absence of Esdrás, an 18-year-old Wilbur Cross student whom Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested and detained last week.

“Esdrás made so many sacrifices. So we, students of New Haven, community members, and activists, are now willing to sacrifice what we can to bring Esdrás back to our community,” Colon said to a roar of support from the crowd.

Connecticut Students for a Dream Executive Director Tabitha Sookdeo, who has been advocating for Esdrás, led a call-and-response plea: ​“ICE out of Connecticut! ICE out of New Haven!”

Rev. Scott Marks, the director of New Haven Rising, urged attendees to consider their own freedom as intertwined with the freedom of their neighbors. He pointed specifically to LGBTQIA+ and immigrant community members as frequent targets of stigma who should be embraced by New Haven Rising’s movement. ​“I was upset when Yale New Haven Hospital cut out the [medication-based] healthcare” for transgender youth, he said. And immigrants are ​“not coming to take our jobs, they’re coming to help us make our jobs better.”

“My issue is our issue. Your issue is my issue,” echoed Feldman.

Correction: Yale is facing an 8 percent endowment tax; the article originally cited an initial proposal for a 21 percent tax.