Push for charter school funding in Middletown
NAACP, others voice frustration over threat of removal from budget
Local elected officials, school representatives, faith leaders, and families joined the Middlesex County Chapter of the NAACP and chair of the state NAACP at the State Capitol on Monday to voice frustration over Capital Prep Middletown being under threat of removal from the biennial state budget.
Anita Ford Saunders, the new president of the Middlesex County NAACP, said she is disappointed by the idea the funding might not come through, as they followed every stage of the state Department of Education request for proposals approval process by completing the 518-page application, garnering huge community support at meetings and public hearings, earning the highest-scoring application, and seeing it pass unanimously through the Legislature’s Appropriations Committee.
She also said she wanted to make it clear the effort is about choice for Middletown parents and students.
“It’s not really about the school. It is about Black and brown people having an opportunity, a choice for their children, just like other people choose to send their child to Mercy or choose to send their child to (another school). It doesn’t cost you to go to Capital Prep, what you get from Capital Prep is a lot more. All we are asking is for the option, the choice. If your child or your family chooses not to go to Capital
Prep, that’s fine…we want the option. We have done every single thing in line with the process…,” she said.
Yvette Highsmith Francis, chair of the Capital Prep Middletown Committee, said she shares the disappointment, as she worked alongside community members, parents, grandparents, leaders, educators, and civic leaders who are excited about the opportunity to make an impact on the educational aspects for their children, especially those who are Black and brown.
environment and hamper local economic development efforts, but these substantial investments for towns across Connecticut will make an invaluable impact on cleaning up the mistakes of the past while building a more sustainable future,” U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-conn, said, in a statement.
U.S. Sen. Murphy, D-conn, said, also in a statement, that redevelopment of brownfields also can spur job creation, in projects “that are good for the environment and will revitalize communities throughout Connecticut that have been stunted by these contaminants.”
The grants announced Monday were funded by President Joe Biden’s “Investing in America Agenda” to quicken assessment and clean-up brownfields sites while advancing environment justice goals. Environmental justice is fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, national origin or income when it comes to development and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations and policies.
The brownfields grant program has been boosted by $1.5 billion from the federal infrastructure bill.