Ernest Willis at his Vernon St. home.
Ernest Willis looked across the street from his home of 30 years at two adjacent, vacant properties. Both had chipped facades. One had a gaping hole in its cellar.
“I hope they tear those down,” he said.
Willis, an 82-year-old retired CTtransit driver, has lived with his family in a two-and-a-half story home at 42 Vernon St. in the Hill since 1988.
He said he gets along well with his neighbors and has enjoyed living on his small, residential block in the shadow of the Yale-New Haven Hospital (YNHH) medical complex on Howard Avenue.
But when he looked out from his front porch on Wednesday afternoon, he saw both encouraging signs of progress and frustrating signs of decay for the block.
Without knowing it, he was also looking out at the latest entry in YNHH’s years-long effort to build affordable housing around the hospital.
Just across the street from Willis’s porch are two three-family homes at 35 Vernon and 37 Vernon.
Vacant homes at 37 and 35 Vernon.
The vacant, two-story home at 37 Vernon is home owned by YNHH. According to city land records, the hospital acquired the property from its prior landlord, Medical Center Reality, Inc. in 2016.
The city’s anti-blight agency, the Livable City Initiative (LCI), issued an anti-blight and property maintenance civil citation to YNHH on Aug. 21 for failing to keep up the vacant property.
According to city land records, Arthur Natalino, Jr., the Hill’s neighborhood specialist, found during an Aug. 20 inspection that the building exterior is dilapidated, the foundation might need to be repaired, the exterior walls need immediate repairs to chipping paint, and landscape maintenance is needed on the sides and rear of the property.
A hole in the side of 37 Vernon.
Natalino’s inspection also found that the property is “open to trespass” and “attracting illegal activity creating a safety concern for the neighborhood.”
Indeed, during a visit this week, one of the sides of the building’s brick exterior visibly contained a gaping hole that looks into the home’s cellar.
The LCI citation notes that YNHH will be on the hook for $100 per day for every day that the blighted conditions continue unaddressed.
Vin Petrini, YNHH’s senior vice president of public affairs, said that 37 Vernon is the latest home on the block that the hospital is hoping to transform into affordable housing either for hospital employees or for other neighborhood residents.
Petrini said that the hospital has been working with the Habitat for Humanity of Greater New Haven over the last several years to renovate, rehabilitate, and construct homes on Vernon Street, Sylvan Avenue, and around the St. Raphael’s campus on Orchard Street.
Two new homes at 45 and 47 Vernon, as built by Yale-New Haven Hospital and Habitat for Humanity.
Petrini said that YNHH and Habitat for Humanity have already built seven new homes on Vernon Street alone over the past few years, including two new properties at 45 and 47 Vernon. He said two families moved into those two new properties just last month.
“This is part of a much broader transformation of Vernon Street that we’ve been working on for the past couple years,” Petrini said. “This is part of a broader plan to create affordable housing that’s new and attractive in the area.”
He said that the homes that YNHH has partnered with Habitat on are open to Habitat’s long list of prospective tenants to move into. He said that the homes are also available for YNHH employees to purchase with the help of Yale’s homebuyer program, which offers $10,000 in forgivable loans as well as $200 off monthly mortgage payments for the first two years of a mortgage.
Petrini said that 37 Vernon is the last lot on the block that YNHH is looking to build on. He said the hospital and Habitat are still assessing the property and have not yet determined whether they can renovate or rehabilitate the existing structure, or whether they need to demolish what’s there and build something new.
Petrini also noted that YNHH provided financial support for the construction of the new Ronald McDonald House, a 20-bedroom medical home for very sick children located at 860 Howard Ave., which is just behind 45 and 47 Vernon.
He said the hospital has invested over $35,000 in sidewalk improvements for Vernon Street as part of the Habitat and Ronald McDonald House rebuilds.
35 Vernon’s porch.
Just next to 37 Vernon is another vacant, dilapidated three-family home. This one, at 35 Vernon, is not owned by the hospital, but by the Orchard Street-based landlord Dirkovril Reid.
LCI also issued an anti-blight and property maintenance civil citation to Reid on Aug. 21 for failing to keep up the vacant property.
The citation notes that LCI’s Natalino found during his Aug. 20 inspection that the building exterior is dilapidated, the front balcony is in need of repair, the exterior walls need to be fixed, the property needs immediate landscape maintenance, and rubbish and debris on the lawn need to be removed.
Paper bowls of dog food on the porch of 35 Vernon.
A Wednesday afternoon visit to the property found a brightly-colored row of flowers planted in front of an otherwise blighted home. The ground-floor windows revealed furniture piled on end inside the home, and a trail of paper bowls filled with dog food lined the front porch.
“Property maintenance is deficient or lacking,” the citation’s boiler plate language reads, “leading to progressive deterioration of said property and the creation of blighted conditions.” The citation notes that the landlord will be fined $100 per day for every day that the blighted conditions continue unaddressed.
Reid told the Independent during over the phone that he will fix up the property, which he hopes to renovate and then rent, as soon as he raises enough money. He said he’s already spent $30,000 fixing up the roof, and that he is looking into getting a loan to repair the rest of the building.
“All I can do is what I can,” he said.
An empty lot at 49 Vernon
But Willis isn’t just concerned with the two dilapidated properties across the way. He said what vexes him most on the block is the vacant, overgrown lot at 49 Vernon St.
Four-foot tall grass spills over the chain link fence and onto the surrounding sidewalk.
According to city land records, the empty lot is owned by a Quogue, N.Y.-based company called Municipal Capital Appreciation Partners through a Connecticut holding company, 49 Vernon LLC. It has owned the property since 2007.
Cracked sidewalk outside of Willis’s home.
Despite the thousands of dollars of sidewalk improvements sponsored by the hospital, Willis said he’s still not satisfied with what he sees outside of his own home.
Pointing to a cracked and uneven sidewalk in front of his home, he said he had hoped that the city would fix the crumbling sidewalk during the Ronald McDonald House’s development.
“We were waiting” on the sidewalk repairs, he said. As of yet, they still haven’t come.
LCI crack down, or LCI on crack? It's more like HOPE beyond worry, if your waiting for LCI to institute fines and other corrective measures for this blighted property.