New Haven Register (Sunday) (New Haven, CT)
Train would turn all Conn. into Fairfield County
Demand for homes could lead to construction spike in Connecticut
If you had to sum up Connecticut’s appeal to other states, it might come down to what we don’t have.
No, we don’t have any major cities, which even in this post-pandemic world are expected to be the major drivers of the world economy, but take a look at that map — we’re right near two of them!
That explains the eternal fascination with reducing commuting times to Boston and, especially, New York, what Senate President Martin Looney called the “holy grail” of transit. If it’s easy to get important places but you can still enjoy a house and a yard, it’s a win for Connecticut, and the reason why lower Fairfield County remains one of the most desired landing spots on the planet, if real estate prices are any indication. Extending that status to the rest of Connecticut is apparently our wildest dream.
So news of the latest iteration of a highspeed train running through the Northeast corridor has again inspired hope for the future. This version of the plan would run under Long Island Sound and emerge in the New Haven area, cutting travel time to New York and Boston by hours.
It’s nice to dream. Big picture, there’s no reason why other countries should have a functioning high-speed rail system and we don’t. It ought to be easy to hop on a train to get to, say, Philadelphia or D.C. in a few hours, and it should cost less to take a family by train into Manhattan than to drive and find parking, though it doesn’t. Why shouldn’t we be able to build these sorts of mega-projects that would carry our economy into the next century, or at least catch us up with this one?
Realistically, though, Milford Mayor Ben Blake spoke for a lot of people when he gave his take on the proposal, which would emerge from the Sound in his city. “This is not something that will ever happen,” Blake told Hearst Connecticut Media’s Luther Turmelle.
We don’t build projects like this anymore. It’s too expensive and there are too many stumbling blocks among the dozens of states, municipalities and other jurisdictions that would have to approve it. Environmental hang-ups alone would probably be insurmountable. “A massive tunnel could disrupt and destroy precious wildlife and habitat,” U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who might have been expected to support such a plan, said. One assumes the English Channel has some precious wildlife and habitat, though they still managed to build a tunnel under it.
But we do need to improve our infrastructure. Forget about Boston to New York, people complain about the commute from Woodbridge to New Haven. And even if we’re not going to build $105 billion supertrains, we could make fixes on a smaller scale that would improve quality of life, and maybe create a situation where we weren’t always looking to outside cities for salvation.
For instance, sidewalks. It’s old news now, but Gov. Ned Lamont’s plans on how to spend all the money we were going to raise from tolls near the start of his term was criticized for its heavy focus on roads. That’s understandable, given how most people get around in this state, and plenty of highways and bridges are due for an upgrade.
But it was also a backwards way of taking on one of our biggest challenges. We need to improve transportation, but if we only focus on what we have now we can never create something better. Sidewalks won’t cut your commute time, but they might improve quality of life in your neighborhood, getting people out of their houses and connecting those who would otherwise never cross paths.
We’re not going to change the fundamentally sprawled nature of development in Connecticut, but any steps we could take to improve our cul-de-sac of a state should be taken. And all the small-bore moves together would cost less than a train under
Long Island Sound.
It’s good to think big on transportation. We should be asking why major projects are all but impossible. But that shouldn’t stop us from making changes in the meantime on the neighborhood level that would bring improvements in people’s lives and not require a decade’s worth of environmental review.
Either way, big picture or short term, the focus should be on something other than cars.
Taking a live snap and eluding tacklers for the first time in more than two years, former UConn quarterback David Pindell scored the first touchdown in Fan Controlled Football history Saturday at Infinite Energy Arena in suburban Atlanta.
He dropped back, rushed right, cut left and dived into the end zone for a team named the Glacier Boyz. The play, not all that different from some of his best at Rentschler Field in 2017 and 2018, was called via vote by fans watching a live stream on Twitch while “coaching” on the league’s mobile app.
“It’s better than I thought it would be,” said Pindell, who as a senior set UConn’s single-season quarterback rushing record with 1,139 yards. “I was telling a receiver that this is a crazy feeling, just getting out on the field and competing again. It put me in a happy place.”
Pindell’s initial instinct was to dismiss FCF as something silly. But through several conversations with famous rapper
Quavo, one of the league’s celebrity team owners, he gave up a job as a truck driver in Maryland to take a chance he figured could only help him realize football dreams he still harbors.
“It can’t hurt,” said Pindell, 24. “And they pay.”
FCF is played 7-on-7 on a 50-yard field. Each game takes about an hour, with
two 20-minute halves and a running clock. A play runs every 70 seconds or so because the pass — most of the play calls are passes, yes — must be voted on, reach the team sideline and be relayed via headset to the quarterback in the huddle.
“It’s fun,” Pindell said. “It just felt good. I was able to do my thing. When you’re watching football, nobody wants to see you hand the ball off all day. It’s basically throwing touchdowns, back and forth. It’s exciting football.”
It is football, yes, just packaged and developed so differently. It is football overlapping with gaming and fantasy sports. It is football with all kinds of quirky rules — starting with who’s in charge of the way games and an inaugural season play out.
The general public essentially serves as the coach and general manager, drafting teams every Wednesday and calling plays in real time each Saturday from a list of options on a phone. There is no kicking or punting. Every touchdown is
followed by a 1-on-1 battle between receiver and defender, with the quarterback having three seconds to throw. Fans vote on game MVPs and best celebration, and both are among incentives for which players can earn bonuses.
Pindell earns $1,450 a game. He is one of eight franchise-tagged players, the only players in the league who remain with the same team throughout the season.
“They saw my UConn highlights,” he said proudly.
Another franchise player is 2012 Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel. Pindell’s Glacier Boyz faced Manziel’s Zappers Saturday. Because all four of the league’s teams practice together during the week and are living in a bubble, the two quarterbacks have become fast friends.
“Johnny is a good dude,” Pindell said.
FCF announced there were 700,000 total live views for Saturday’s opening games, and the league app was the most-downloaded sports app on the Apple Store between Saturday-Monday. Manziel’s 38-yard run on Zappers’ first play drew over 2 million views on Twitter and Instagram.
FCF features many former Division I players, including former South Florida quarterback Quinton Flowers, and there is a heavy celebrity backing. Team owners include retired NFL running back Marshawn Lynch and former UConn/WNBA player Renee Montgomery (Beasts), Chargers running back Austin Ekeler (Wild Aces) and Mets pitcher Trevor May (Zappers). Quavo is one of three owners of the Glacier Boyz, with NFL cornerback Richard Sherman and Donald De La Haye, AKA “Deestroying,” a famous YouTube personality who was a kicker at Central Florida.
Pindell has spent considerable time on social media since departing UConn in an anxious effort to latch on with a professional team, posting workout videos to Instagram and Twitter. He had several XFL and CFL tryouts canceled due to the pandemic and finally signed a contract in November with the Columbus Lions of the National Arena League.
That season is scheduled to begin in May. Pindell took that job as a truck driver to get by in the meantime.
Then, Quavo reached out — first through Instagram, then with a phone call.
“He said, ‘You still ballin’? You looking to get signed?” Pindell said. “Quavo was like, ‘You should come play for my team.’ I was just like, ‘Is this for real?’ He said it’s going to blow up. At first, I was doubting the idea. I was like, ‘I don’t know, this looks kind of funny.’ I Googled it and it just didn’t look official. I told [Quavo] my agent is probably not going to want me to do this.’”
Then again, what was there to lose? If the XFL or CFL is to be in Pindell’s future, he probably needs some recent game film to show off.
“So like a week later, Quavo reached back out and said, ‘Bro, what can I do to get you on my team?’” Pindell said. “I was like — you know what? — it’s Quavo. He’s definitely got a lot of connections and a lot of exposure. And I just wanted to play football. It’s fun, just getting on a field and competing again.”
Amani Abuhatab scored 25 points and added 17 rebounds to lead the West Haven girls basketball team to a 58-50 SCC win over East Haven on Saturday.
Kassidy Carrano added 14 points and five rebounds for the Blue Devils. Erin Curran had 15 points and Juliana Iovino added 11 for the Easties.
West Haven outscored East Haven 18-9 in the fourth quarter to secure the win.
Hand 52, Hillhouse 30: Brooke Salutari and Sophia Coppola scored 13 points each to lead the Tigers to an SCC win. Natalie Lucas added 10 points for the Tigers. Trinity Moody scored 16 points for the Academics to lead all scorers.
Morgan 56, Valley Regional 37: A 34-point second-half surge secured a Shoreline Conference win for the Huskies. Catie Donadio scored 28 points for Morgan, while Abby Bradbury led Valley Regional with 14 points.
Shelton 42, Cheshire 32: Clarissa Pierre had 18 points and Laryssa Guimaraes added 12 to led the
Gaels to an SCC win. Grace Lurz led the Rams with 14 points.
Wilbur Cross 50, Guilford 40: Jaylice Rosario scored 17 points to propel Wilbur Cross past Guilford. Guilford’s Moira Kellaher led all scorers with 18 points.
BOYS BASKETBALL
Fairfield Prep 70, Hamden 47: Max Manjos had 27 points and Carey Logan added 15 to lead Fairfield Prep to an SCC win.
Seymour 80, Derby 65:
Dion Perkins had 35 points and 10 rebounds and Kyle Harmeling added 15 points to lead the Wildcats to an NVL win in Seymour.
Caden Drezek had 12 points and 10 rebounds and Joe Orlando had 12 rebounds and nine points for the Wildcats (2-0). Ken Little III led the Red Raiders with 22 points and Taeshaun Sanchez added 19.
Xavier 51, Cheshire 40:
Justin Menard had 22 points and Parker Hunter added 15 to lead the Falcons (2-1) to an SCC win in Middletown. Yasha Laskin led the Rams (1-2) with 13 points.
As properties go, it was not going to last long on the market — a dream home on more than an acre of land in Greenwich, abutting more than three acres of conservation area and priced at a mere $1.8 million in an enclave where other houses are selling for more than $5 million.
The only element missing? The dream home itself, which exists only in the mind of the buyer who bought the acreage. But it won’t be long before a builder has that blueprint in hand, as a backhoe breaks ground on a new house.
As home hunters pounce on listings nearly as fast as sellers are putting them onto the market in Connecticut, construction of single-family homes is shaping up as the state’s next boom following a decade of apartment construction.
The last burst of new construction in Connecticut in 2008 ended up with many homes built “on spec” languishing empty for extended periods and some going into
foreclosure for lack of buyers, after a hot housing market imploded in the subprime mortgage collapse that triggered the Great Recession.
But experts agree that the COVID-19 pandemic continues to drive city dwellers to outlying towns, as more employers embrace remote working arrangements they cobbled together on the fly last year.
The CEO of Berkshire
Hathaway HomeServices New England Properties does not see a spec-building bubble like 2007 in the offing, but says there is sufficient interest in Connecticut options that newly built homes will find buyers in a hurry.
“We’re seeing more permits, for sure, and we’ll see more builders much more willing to bring their product and at a little bit higher of a price,” said Candace
Adams, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices New England Properties. “I’ve gotten ... inquiries for large parcels of land in Connecticut of people looking to develop it.”
Low interest rates, high lumber prices
A year after permits for apartments outnumbered new houses in Connecticut by 1,300 units, the pendulum swung in the opposite direction last year according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The more than 2,900 home permits estimated by the Census Bureau was the highest total since 2008, when municipal officials signed off on nearly 3,100 projects.
The SmartMLS multiple listing service had more than 2,500 listings for available residential lots in Connecticut, from a 19-acre waterfront spread on Greenwich’s Field Point Road priced at more than $45 million to a 33-acre wooded parcel in Stonington that sold this week for less than $1 million. Many of those lots carry approvals to be
To register, visit www.ctglc.org; to participate, the link is https://us04web.zoom.us /j/8289436490.
Caron joins O,R&L Commercial
Kyleigh Caron has joined O,R&L Commercial as a commercial and investment sales broker in the firm’s Rocky Hill office, according to a release.
Caron “acts as both a listing agent and buyer/ tenant representative, with
a concentration in investment sales,” the release said, and has previous experience in the industry in a position in Boston.
O,R&L Commercial has
offices in Branford and Rocky Hill. Caron can be reached at 860-761-6004 or kcaron@orlcommercial.com.
Czarnowski joins Neubert, Pepe & Monteith
NEW HAVEN — Attorney Jennifer E. Czarnowski has joined the Real Estate and Commercial Finance & Banking practice groups of Neubert, Pepe & Monteith, P.C., according to a release.
Czarnowski previously was involved in the firm as a legal extern while studying at Quinnipiac
University School of Law, and then as a summer associate and then law clerk before becoming an associate with the firm, the release said.
According to the firm, Czarnowski has experience in residential and commercial real estate transactions and civil litigation, as well as a decade of “combined experience in project and account management, business development, and management information systems.”
“Jennifer joined us initially as an extern through Quinnipiac University, and we were immediately impressed
with her work,” Jane Elaine Ballerini, partner, said in the release. “NPM is now pleased to have Jennifer join our commercial finance and real estate teams as an Associate. As we practice in these unconventional times, she is an energetic and welcome addition.”
Czarnowski earned a B.S. in business administration from the University of Connecticut and a J.D. from Quinnipiac University School of Law, cum laude, the release said.
Neubert, Pepe & Monteith, P.C. is a general practice law firm in New Haven with offices in Hartford and Fairfield, as well as in White Plains, New York. For more information, visit npmlaw.com.
Steve Shwartz isn’t particularly worried about artificial intelligence, and if anyone should know whether or not to panic, it’s him. He’s been working in artificial intelligence since 1979, when he enrolled in a post-doctorate program at Yale. Since then, he’s been an entrepreneur, opening
AI and non-AI companies. Now, he chairs the board for one of those companies, Device42, which he founded in 2012.
And he’s written a book to ease the public’s worry about AI technologies. “Evil Robots, Killer Computers, and Other Myths” explores the future of AI, and explains how it intersects with humanity.
Shwartz chatted with Hearst Connecticut Media via email about the book, which was published earlier this month.
Sarajane Sullivan: Do you see the advancements of artificial intelligence as good or bad? It makes a lot of people feel uneasy, but why is that? Should we feel hesitant and why or why not?
Steve Shwartz: AI is having a huge impact on society that is mostly but not all good. AI makes our lives easier by enabling us to talk to our smartphones, translate language in foreign countries and automatically label our photos. It brings a promise of self-driving cars that
may someday eliminate fatalities and provide mobility for seniors and the disabled. It is revolutionizing medicine, identifying hate speech, and stopping cyberattacks.
At the same time, AI systems are susceptible to inadvertent discrimination. Facial recognition systems incorrectly identify minorities as terrorists and criminals. AI-based decision systems make loans and hiring decisions that are often discriminatory. AI also creates privacy issues that threaten to create a 1984-style society in which people are constantly monitored. AI-based weapons are also a concern – though not as big a concern as depicted in science fiction. And AI makes it easier to create fake news which threatens our elections (though see below for a caveat). These are serous issues; however, good progress is being made on all of them.
The biggest concern around AI is that it will take over the world, turn us into pets, or take all our jobs. Elon Musk called AI “the biggest existential threat to humanity.” This is all fiction and no one should be concerned about any of these things.
Sullivan: Is there an AI trend coming in the next few years that you feel will change the way humans live their lives? If so, what is it and how will it affect us?
Shwartz: I believe that issues like discrimination and privacy are wellunderstood and that we are well on the way to resolving those issues.
My biggest concern is self-driving vehicles. There is a general belief that self-driving vehicles will improve safety. While it is certainly true that self-driving vehicles have the potential to react more quickly than humans, there is also strong technical evidence that self-driving vehicles will make bad decisions that humans wouldn’t make. A bad decision made quickly can still cause an accident. Yet, governments all over the world are rushing to pave the way for this technology without appropriate safety testing and the result will be accidents and massive traffic jams.
The NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) has stated that it probably won’t require safety testing of self-driving capabilities. If in fact the inevitable bad decisions lead to a high rate of accidents and/or traffic jams, this policy could prove to be disastrous. My view is that we should take a step back and require safety testing.
Sullivan: What are some of the most outlandish rumors or misconceptions you’ve heard about AI technology and how do you debunk them?
Shwartz: Number one is the idea that AI systems will develop human-level intelligence and/or superhuman intelligence and take over the world. As I explain in my book, the reality is that today’s AI systems represent clever engineering but have no human-level intelligence. Moreover, the technology behind these systems cannot evolve into human-level intelligence and AI researchers have no concrete ideas of how to create human-level intelligence.
Number two is the idea that AI will take all of our jobs. If AI systems could read books and take classes, then yes, they could learn all our jobs. But this is fiction and will remain fiction. The reality is that, while AI systems will cause some job loss, the degree of job loss will be far less than that caused by conventional software technology.
Number three is the idea that AI can understand language. For example, in 2018, Microsoft claimed to have built a system that reads better than humans. The reality is that this system doesn’t understand language at all and uses some very clever engineering to outperform humans on a single “reading comprehension” test. IBM made a similar claim when it’s Watson DeepQA computer beat two Jeopardy! champions in 2012. Both systems are clearly detailed in technical papers that explain the clever engineering.
Number four is that AI systems can generate credible fake news. There has been a great deal of press around GPT-3 and similar AI systems that generate fake news articles. However, these systems have no knowledge of the world and the generated text is typically riddled with incorrect facts that are easily detected with a modicum of fact-checking.
Sullivan: What is one thing you wish people outside the tech field understood about AI?
Shwartz: AI systems are amazing engineering feats and do things that seem intelligent but none of these systems have any human-like intelligent whatsoever, and AI researchers have no idea how to build human-level intelligence into computers or robots. More importantly, the amazing engineering feats of AI should not be taken as an indication that progress will lead to human-level intelligence.
Netflix has really been leaning into book-to-screen adaptations lately. Some of them have been done spectacularly well and others have had bumpy page-toscreen transitions.
The streaming giant’s latest book adaptation, “Firefly Lane,” stars Connecticut native Katherine Heigl (“Grey’s Anatomy” and “27 Dresses”) and Sarah Chalke (“Scrubs”) as two women who experience the highs and lows of their decades-long friendship.
While the series doesn’t quite stick to author Kristin Hannah’s source material, the series hops back and forth through time as Kate and Tully grip tightly to their friendship as teenagers in the ’70s, career-focused women in the ’80s and take life’s punches in the early 2000s.
“Firefly Lane” explores how Kate and Tully’s friendship evolves over time and examines the complicated twists and balancing act that their relationship becomes.
As a teenager, Kate is lonely until wild child Tully moves in across the street, igniting a bonedeep friendship. Tully had an unconventional childhood and lies about her mother to conceal that the mother is neglectful and a drug addict.
As the story weaves back and forth through time, audiences see how Tully’s unhappy childhood has shaped her into a woman who craves an audience to feel seen. Kate, on the other hand, has been more or less content to stick to the sidelines while Tully shines in the spotlight.
Viewers witnesses the early stages and the demise of Kate’s marriage to her husband, Johnny. While she tries to come to terms with her divorce and to shield her teenage daughter from her marital problems, Tully is focused on her “Ellen”- like talk show and frets about how to boost the show’s flagging ratings.
Heigl shines in the series as she plays up Tully’s vibrance and whirlwind ambition, which allow the actress to show off the acting chops that made her so beloved in
“Grey’s Anatomy.”
Chalke’s performance matches Heigl’s punch for punch as she plays the more subdued but funny Kate. The two actresses have great chemistry, making their heartfelt and slightly co-dependent friendship all the more intriguing.
As the show moves forward, hints are dropped that the inseparable pair will be ripped from one another, which adds a delicious tension to the series as viewers wonder what could possibly divide Kate and Tully.
Unfortunately, the finale leaves viewers with more questions than answers, which hopefully indicates that a second season of “Firefly Lane” is in the works.
In addition to one of the stars being from Connecticut, it should also be noted that in the series Hiegl wears jewelry from Connecticut jewelry designers Jewels for Hope. In a previous interview with Hearst Connecticut Media, the mother/daughter duo behind Jewels for Hope, Sandy and Stevie D'Andrea said they were “blown away” to have their jewelry featured in the show.
Audiences should note that “Firefly Lane” has plotlines that deal with drug abuse, child abuse, sexual assault and miscarriages. The series is rated TV-MA and has one season available on Netflix.
Dear Abby: On Sept. 14, 2017, you printed my letter about my ex-husband “borrowing” money from my 13-year-old son’s piggy bank. Soon after, you reached out to tell me a gentleman (the founder of an organization that helps people who have been wronged) wanted to send my son twice the amount of money that had been taken from him. My son was humbled, to say the least. Not only did that gesture restore my son’s faith in people, but he gained from it a friend who made a lasting impression.
Bill, the man who helped my son, told my son his own father took money from him when he was younger, which forced him to drop out of college. However, Bill didn’t let that stop him from becoming a success in life. Decades later, he retired a wealthy man. In retirement, he started a philanthropic foundation and turned his own “adversity into opportunity” by reaching out to others less fortunate to make a difference.
We were devastated to learn recently of Bill’s unexpected passing from a stroke. Our hearts are broken, but my son’s is forever changed and filled with gratitude for having known Bill, even if only for a short time. Abby, thank you for printing my letter three years ago. Without it, none of this would have been possible. We would also like to extend our sincere condolences to Bill’s wife and family. His kind soul touched my son so deeply that his spirit will continue to live on.
Hoping to Pay It Forward
Dear Hoping: What a beautiful tribute to a man whose life was well-lived.
I hope his family sees your letter. I have often said that Dear Abby readers are the most generous in the world. Bill was an example of that, and I am sure he will be greatly missed. I would like to extend my condolences to his grieving family along with your own.
Dear Abby: I’m one of those sad, stupid women who hang onto dreams of being with the man I love. I will be 70 next year, and I have spent more than 20 years waiting first for his children to grow up, then for the company to grow, etc. It never ends. How I got into this mindset, I can’t explain.
It’s too late for me, but I want to pass this on to younger women: Get a life. Expand your horizons. Go to school. Be yourselves. Make YOURSELF happy. Dreams are dreams; life is reality. I’m not asking you for advice,
Abby, because I now see the light.
Finally Knows in Illinois
Dear Finally Knows: Please don’t call yourself names. You have learned a valuable lesson, and thank you for wanting to share it. What you wrote is true, and I hope it will provide inspiration to the women to whom you are addressing your message. And one more thing: It is NOT necessarily “too late” for you. Your life isn’t over, and if my life is any example, you never know where the road will lead you.
Write to Dear Abby at P.O. Box 96440, Los Angeles, CA 90069 or dearabby. com