Trashed Empty Lot Transformed

For more than a decade after old condos were torn down and the city claimed the property, the empty lots atop Judith Terrace were vacant. Dumpers littered them. Joy-riders swooped through to evade the police.

The land was cleaned up over the years and bollards deployed. But a profounder change at the top of Judith Terrace was celebrated Wednesday afternoon — new life in the form of five brand new two-family homes.

Mayor Toni Harp, along with staffers from the city’s Livable City Initiative (LCI), and state housing officials, cut the ribbon on the little compound of five two-family homes on the winding promontory of a residential street high above Quinnipiac Avenue in Fair Haven Heights, .

The homes all have sale agreements pending with five working New Haven families. The mayor hailed the event as emblematic of the ongoing city initiative to promote neighborhood stability through home ownership.

The $2.5 million project was funded through $1.2 million from the Connecticut Department of Housing Affordable Housing Program and $1.3 million in city funds. LCI served as the developer, with project manager Mark Wilson in the lead. Most of the work was done with local New Haven businesses and tradesmen.

Families such as that of Carlos and Maricel Ramos, who are waiting to close on the house at 103 – 105 Judith Terrace house, showed visitors around shining kitchen counters at Wednesday’s event. Maricel Ramos noted the panoramic views from the second-floor back porch, looking out onto the entire city as it spreads out toward the Q Bridge.

“I can’t wait to set up my table and take my coffee out there,” she said.

In order to qualify to purchase the homes at the set $209,000 price, all the families, like the Ramos family — who have six kids ages 18, 17, 11 10, 5, and 4 — must earn no more than the area median income, which is $82,000 for a family of four.

The families’ mortgage payments also many not exceed 30 percent of their monthly gross income, said Michelle Mateo, of the East Haven-based Kaerus Property Group, which handled all the sales.

She said the two-families all sold quickly.

For Carlos Ramos, who works for Comcast, and his wife, who is a licensed day car provider taking care of six kids in the home they currently rent in the Hill, the Judith Terrace house will be the first time they become homeowners.

That also was one of the requirements — that the families have not owned a home at least in three years.

Mayor Harp praised her LCI staffers. ​“They used New Haven workers and New Haven businesses to build these,“she noted.

On a lot that was empty and cluttered for 15 years, LCI’s Exeuctive Director Serena Neal-Sanjurjo called attention to the partnership with the state to advance neighborhood stabilization.

In a phase two of the Judith Terrace project, the bollards that make the current dead end are to be removed. They prevent prevent access from the top of Judith Terrace to nearby Riverview Street. There two single-family houses are to built, with that project to begin in months.

Neal-Sanjurjo said similar homeowner initiatives are slated for Dwight, Newhallville, Fair Haven, and West River.

Project Manager Wilson said next up after Judith Terrace work is complete would be a number of houses in Newhallville near Winchester Avenue and Thompson Street.

The entire Judith Terrace project took about a year, Wilson said. As developer, LCI will reap some profits, but they will ​“revolve,” said Wilson. That means they go right into LCI’s next project.

In addition to the initiative at Judith Terrace, Neal-Sanjurjo said LCI is working with other homeowners along the street in a program to help them make exterior repairs and on plantings and other applications to beautify the neighborhood.

Joniel Ramos was thinking about none of that at the moment. He said he is looking forward to having his own bedroom.