Norwich residents discuss what the city needs to succeed
Wednesday’s forum addresses economy
Norwich — Improve the city school system, reopen the YMCA or open a new community center, and foster more community pride and unity. These were ideas proposed by city residents and City Council candidates Wednesday at a forum to address the economic needs of the city.
The Thames Valley Council for Community Action led the discussion for 10 participants Wednesday at Otis Library, part of a study accompanying a $15,000 Working Cities Challenge grant received in March from the United Way of Southeastern Connecticut to design a plan to improve economic development.
Agencies involved in the study used as its basis a statistic from the latest ALICE Report Update — Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed — that 47 percent of Norwich residents cannot afford basic needs. Additionally, the cost of living continues to increase faster than workers’ wages.
The Working Cities Challenge grant work will be used to apply for a larger implementation grant, said Megan Brown, senior director of marketing and development at TVCCA, who moderated Wednesday’s discussion.
Carrie Dyer of Reliance Health said the recent drug addiction crisis, which has hit Norwich especially hard, affects people of all socio-economic levels, from homeless people living in the woods to stable
families. She said over-use of prescriptions and lack of treatment are among the problems.
A report released last week showed Norwich leading the region in the number of opioid overdose deaths this year, with 19 thus far.
Joseph DeLucia, Democratic City Council candidate, said he would look to expand the roles of city schools to help prevent drug abuse by opening schools early, expanding school breakfasts to needy children and providing extensive after-school recreation programs at the school buildings.
Several people found it incredible that a city Norwich’s size doesn’t have a YMCA or similar youth center, and given the economic picture of city families, the programs would have to be inexpensive or free, participants said.
Zato Kadambaya, a Democratic City Council candidate and former head of the math department at Norwich Free Academy, said the city needs to strengthen its education system for the lower grades. He said NFA, Three Rivers Community College and other colleges in the area are attractive. But he said some parents of NFA students had told him they moved to one of the other NFA sending towns to have access to the academy, “but not to Norwich.”
Discussion of economic development quickly turned to Taftville and the Ponemah Mill, where a $28 million renovation is creating 116 new apartments expected to open this fall. Opinions varied, however, on whether the development there would spread to benefit the entire city. Deborah Monahan, executive director of TVCCA, said the Taftville development could be a “model” for other city development.
But resident Sandy Quarto said she expects the Ponemah development to become “a little neighborhood” of its own, with stores and ancillary development in the immediate area to serve the new residents and Taftville village, a good thing for that area of the city, she said.