Neighbors Protest 88 Olive Demolition

Wooster Square neighbors gathered across from 88 Olive St. on Friday to protest United Illuminating’s plans to demolish its old electric substation at the property.

Given the neighborhood’s response, the city intends to ask UI for a 30-day delay in the demolition to explore other options for the property.

Mike Piscitelli, the city’s acting development administrator, told the group that his office has been in contact with UI about options for how the building might be repurposed. He wants to ​“see that before we lose an asset, we’ve looked under every rock to make sure that we can identify something that works,” he said.

Piscitelli explained that UI has received legal permission for the demolition, but the city will ask for the delay anyway.

“We’re hopeful that UI will call a 30-day pause at a minimum,” he said.

UI had first explained to neighbors that the company wanted to demolish the building to reduce the property taxes it owes the city. Then, according to neighbors, the company began citing toxic polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) discovered inside the building, which once contained an active electrical transformer, as a reason that the building needs to be demolished.

In an email, co-organizer of the press conference and Urban Design League President Anstress Farwell wrote that UI representatives had shared that the building was contaminated with less than 25ppm of PCBs, which meets the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s cleanup standards.

“The State and Federal regulations for clean-up standards, which UI must follow, allow for many potential mechanisms for remediation, including encapsulation etc., that do not involve demolition,” Farwell wrote.

UI did not respond to a request for comment before this article was published. Company spokesperson Ed Crowder previously told the Independent that between 2016 and 2017, UI performed environmental abatement work at the 88 Olive location. He said in May that UI does not have specific plans for the property’s uses in the future, adding that ​“when demolition is complete, the site will be suitable for future use consistent with its zoning.”

At the Downtown-Wooster Square Community Management Team’s meeting in May, UI Project Manager Shawn Crosbie offered to share a report on the property’s environmental remediation history in the future. Neighbors said they never provided the report.

Van Spruill, who lives nearby, decried what he called a lack of transparency regarding UI’s claims of high PCB levels.

“The bottom line is that until you get the paperwork saying that it’s ok in there, it’s still a big question mark,” Spruill said. ​“Why is it so hard to come up with a report?”

“Who knows what’s in that deep dark building?” he added.

Wooster Square neighbor Oyere Onuma said that she and her sister, Brooklynite Uloma Onuma, have reached out to UI with an offer to purchase the property. They hope to open a cafe-bistro in the area, a proposal for which neighbors at the press conference expressed support. Onuma said that UI representatives ​“haven’t been responsive.”

Having read the EPA’s environmental regulations, Onuma argued that it’s possible to work with the existing substation building to bring it up to code.

“It’s a handsome looking brick building. It’s in a great location. It fits right into the neighborhood,” she said.

“We’ve not heard any resistance from neighbors,” she said, adding that there isn’t currently a bistro in the Wooster Square neighborhood.

In a statement read by Aaron Goode, the secretary of the neighborhood’s Community Management Team, Ward 7 Alder Abby Roth wrote that she is disappointed in ​“UI’s lack of meaningful community engagement.”

“I cannot understand why UI is unwilling to meet with neighbors, including one who is interested in purchasing the Olive St. property with the substation in place to create a neighborhood Bistro Cafe,” Roth wrote.

“Empty lots are not positive for neighborhoods or for New Haven’s Grand List. A cafe bistro at 88 Olive St. would enliven this neighborhood. An empty lot risks becoming a location for blight.”

In her remarks to the group, Farwell called for the company to ​“show respect” for the neighborhood, which she said is the densest residential area in the city.

“Everyone here writes a check every month to UI. We’re all UI’s customers,” Farwell said.

“Putting all the embodied energy of every brick that was laid and transported and burned into the landfill, rather than reusing it, is really irresponsible,” she added.

UI has already delayed the building’s demolition, having initially planned to take down the building in mid-June. The substation has been closed since 2013.