Adrianna Lovegrove

Art or Vandalism?

Operating an aerial lift, Megan Craig stood three stories high painting salt water marshes on the upper levels of Cold Spring School, a progressive independent school on James Street in New Haven. With a projector shining the image on to the side of the building, Craig drew the images of the native plants while students gathered around to join in on the nighttime party. This was just one day out of the 6-month long project where Craig would come out and work with students to paint the building.

Megan Craig worked with the students of Cold Spring School for six months on the mural of salt water marshes.

There are many forms of art that can be found whether it is commissioned, a mural, a sculpture, a tribute or a tag, artists are just looking to express themselves or their views. With cities and local communities beginning to endorse and commission works of art throughout town, public art and graffiti battle to find a balance.

Craig was a parent of one of the students at the school and after noticing the bricked-over windows at Cold Spring School, Craig decided to reach out and suggested painting a mural on the wall. She had previously worked with an organization called CITYarts in New York, where artists work with local public schools to create public art.

“It seemed very unfortunate to have a building in that neighborhood that had this sort of fortress-prison like quality with these concrete openings,” Craig said.

The mural depicts the different types of salt marshes that are native to the area and the different types of wildlife that abide there. The fifth graders at the school also spend a large chunk of time studying the salt marshes as a part of their curriculum. Craig and the students worked on an interactive sign where all the plants and animals featured in the painting can be found. It was critical that the project was able to tie back into the curriculum for the community to get on board.

“The idea was to make a mural that could also be sort of a learning wall,” said Craig. “I think once we were able to tie the mural into the curriculum, especially the teachers were a lot more excited about it and, and it really kind of gained momentum.”

Although the school was on board with the idea of a mural, the vibe of the community was still mixed. While some people were enthusiastic about the idea of the painting others felt like the area was fine the way it was.

“I think a lot of people were very enthusiastic ” Craig said. “And were sort of like, yes, anything’s better than these concrete block windows. But there were several people who felt like the block was actually fine and it was this very quiet kind of serene facade and why mess with that? So it was a mixed kind of reaction.”

With community projects, Craig has found it vital to make sure that the members of the community feel involved in the process. This fall, Craig worked on a geometric painting on Pearl Street that led up to the Yale School of Management. In order to make the neighborhood to feel included in the design process, she made numerous designs for the community to choose from and presented them over several meetings with the neighborhood.

Geometric pattern that Craig painted in front of the Yale School of Management on the corner of Pearl and Lincoln Street.

New Haven communities have been working with local organizations to commission murals across the city, including the New Haven and the Cedar Hill murals.

Along the same lines, Hartford has been working on a new initiative to work with local artists called Paint the City. The project worked with the communities to pick the designs that would win the competition. Seven were chosen as the beginning of the 14 mural project that the city was hoping to see. The city had put $128,000 into the project as a part of the public-improvement initiative Hartford Decides.

As a private school, Cold Spring School was able to decide whether they wanted to commission a mural on the side of their building without having to ask for permission from state or city officials. When it comes to public property though there are rules and regulations that artists must follow.

Hartford artist Corey Pane has been commissioned to work on a lot of public and private property throughout his career and hit multiple roadblocks when it comes to getting a building approved.

“A lot of times when I’ve done stuff through the city, you have to go through the city,” Pane said. “There’s paperwork, you have to get permits, get permission from the mayor and all that stuff takes forever. So there’s been a couple of times where I almost had a wall and I’ve been really excited about it and just kind of fizzles out because the paperwork or like somebody didn’t allow permission or something.”

While commissioned work and community art projects are well received, there are still concerns about tagging, where an individual will use a symbol or series of symbols to mark their territory. On SeeClickFix, a public forum where residents can go and voice their concerns regarding numerous topics, there have been plenty of concerns about graffiti popping up around New Haven.
One user pointed out the symbol of three circles forming a triangle on numerous spots around New Haven.

“I’ve seen a surge in this type of graffiti / tagging across new haven,” SeeClickFix user Winchester-Dixwell-Community said. “I’m assuming it’s gang related. It has surged in the last two weeks so I’m wondering what’s going on. I wish the city would step in swiftly clean this type of tagging.”

Though the city has rules and regulations in place, some residents feel as though they aren’t moving fast enough to clean up the city. In response to one of the posts about graffiti a user commented advice on how to clean it up.

“I bought some graffiti removal wipes on Amazon,” Winchester-Dixwell-Community said. “They work really well. I got tired of waiting for the city to clean up the graffiti in my neighborhood (they never do). You might have to do the same.”

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While graffiti can bring life and beauty to a city, it also costs the city a lot of money to clean up. New Haven budgets approximately $30,000 a year to cleaning up paint around the city, according to the Livable City Initiative Downtown/Wooster Neighborhood specialist, Carmen Mendez.

“Unfortunately, no sooner do we clean it up before another graffiti artist thinks it’s a clean canvass for their graffiti,” Mendez said. “It is a vicious cycle that the City loses time and time again. There are more graffiti artists then there is money to clean it up.”

Graffiti goes against the anti-blight and property maintenance laws. The law states that when considering “the foundation walls of every building,” “the exterior of buildings,” “fences” and “storefronts,” have to remain free of any graffiti.

“Even if we know who the graffiti artist is, unless we catch them in the act or have a picture that ties them to the graffiti, we can do nothing,” Mendez said. “The penalties are stiff per graffiti piece, and we do prosecute. However, to get them to pay, let’s say $9-15,000.00 takes a long time, even when the judges rule in our favor.”

New Haven mural by Josh Griffin at 1050 State St.

As local neighborhoods begin to raise money for murals around town, many are left to wonder what the difference is between paid art and free art? What’s the difference between street art and graffiti? John O’Grodnick, a visual artist based out of New York City believes the difference is only found in the legality of where the art is placed.

The main difference between Street art/Murals and Graffiti is that Most of the time street art is legally and paid by the owner of the building,” O’Grodnick said. “Graffiti is almost always done illegally or without permission and that’s why it’s looked down upon.”

The moral dilemma is finding the line to draw in between expression and defamation. While art can be beautiful and liven up a city or town, can it cross a boundary? And where is that boundary?

“I never think it’s a good idea to, to paint on somebody’s property, you know, as people who are property owners who have to deal with graffiti,” said Craig. “But I do think there should be more open areas for street art where people do not have to get permits, do not have to get permission and have access to big surfaces that they can express themselves in an urban environment.”

Heaven Skate Park: Museum of Public Art, located in Hartford, allows for artists to freely paint across the grounds of the park. There are no rules or regulations regarding who can paint what or where.

“I would say just let it all happen,” said Pane. “I don’t care. Like even like little tags and stuff. If you just do other stuff and it’s like a building that it’s not really bothering you. I don’t see a problem.”

While members of the community work together to clean up graffiti or tags that they don’t feel represent their area well, there are still many works of art around town that portray the culture and life of those around them. With murals and commissioned work popping up around town like the “Greetings from New Haven” and “Welcome to Cedar Hill,” there is an acknowledgement that art, commissioned or not, does bring pride and joy into the community.

Q&A With Mayor Curt Leng

By Adrianna Lovegrove

Mayor Curt Leng is running for re-election against Councilwoman Lauren Garrett in the Democratic primary. The primary will determine who is going to run against Republican candidate, Jay Kaye. Find out where you can vote here. This article was originally published on Sept. 10, 2019.

Q: What was it that made you want to run for a third term?

A: Serving as mayor for four years seems like a lot longer term than it actually is and it gives you the chance to get a lot of things started and a lot of things moving but you need more time to really see them through. A third term would allow us to continue the financial stabilization we’ve been working on, some of the major buildings and infrastructure investments that we’ve been doing, and then some of the changes to the police department that have been really proven successful.

Q: What were some of the projects that you wanted to see through to the next term if you were re-elected?

A: Two of them in particular, that we’ve got grant applications in the state and we’ve gotten word that we’re in the running and we’re very hopeful would be: Fire Station 2 and the Keefe Community Center. We’ve got about $4.5 million grant request in for renovations to add reconstruction to one of those buildings. And those buildings haven’t been touched in decades and are desperately in need of repair.

We have paved 45 miles of road in the last four years but we have a lot of roads that still need attention. I want to continue that paving schedule and sidewalk improvements to go along with them. So that our neighborhoods have more walkability with the sidewalks and we can save a few axles, where people are hitting our potholes.

On the financial end, we’ve been successful in negotiating every single union contract to include cost savings in health insurance Everyone in the entire town has switched over to a high deductible health savings account, HSA. It’s proving to save money. They’re actually showing medical costs savings. Medical in the budget is ⅕ of our town budget. So slowing the rate of increase of medical insurance impacts the towns annual budget by millions of dollars. And usually, for the past decade plus, the increases in our health insurance account that we expect each year, has been anywhere from 8%to 15%. This year it was 3 percent to 5 percent. So we’re finally actually seeing that impact of all the different unions moving forward with the health insurance program and showing some serious savings.

Q: What has been your biggest challenge so far?

A: Probably the same as any campaign. Just working to get your message out to as many people as you can and trying to be the actual person that directly talks to as many people as possible in town. And there is never enough time in the day to accomplish all those things.

Q: Do you think that during your two terms that you have been financially irresponsible?

A: No. We have very tangible improvements in our town finances and I’ll give some specific examples.

So, we talked about the union contracts. The union contracts are some of the largest drivers of your budget. The town’s pension plan, 10 years ago, was down to 9% funded. It was almost broke now, after a lot of reform efforts, and those reform efforts included some borrowing but the borrowing happened eight years ago and we’ve made eight payments on that borrowing. But beyond that we’ve been contributing higher amounts into the fund. In the last four years alone, we put in $64 million, which is more than double the length of time in the town’s history. So we’re putting more money in, the employees that we’ve negotiated with, that was the second part of the contract negotiations that was a big impact driver was the pension. We’re still working with the public safety union, but every other union on the town and the board of education side agreed to additional contributions into the pension fund and a reduction of the cost of living adjustment in retirement. Those two changes had an impact on our pension liability as a town, saving us approximately $25 million.

We look at our finances on a daily basis and that’s always the focus. The town’s mill rate is already too high and we need to do everything we can to hold it back. I did four budgets and in one of the budgets we did no increase, the first no increase budget in a decade. This year, I recommended a mill rate increase of three quarters of a mill and the council voted for an almost 2.5 times higher tax increase this year. Which would have pushed Hamden to 50 mills, 49.99. That would have been harmful to our residents. It was not necessary and it would’ve sent a bad message to anyone that might want to invest here, whether buying a home or investing to bring a business here. It would show that the mill rate is already high and yet you see excessive increases. It’s not a good way to market the town as a sustainable entity and we are a sustainable entity.

Q: Quinnipiac and Hamden have always had a rocky relationship. Why do you think that is?

A: It’s been up and down. There is a very small percentage of students that don’t behave like the rest of the students do and don’t behave in a way that a typical neighbor would on a typical neighbor street. You buy a house and you don’t expect there to be loud parties and a lot of people and a lot of traffic on any given night into late hours. I want to really stress that it’s a small percentage of the students and a small percentage of the off-campus housing. But it makes it very difficult for certain residents and certain neighbors in certain streets and it gives everyone that has an off-campus house a bad reputation. I know it’s not fair but that’s what tends to happen. So then because of that a lot of residents end up being very vocal in their opposition in different things that the university brings forward to our planning and zoning and other approvals.

So we’re really working hard. President Olian and I have developed a relationship. We actually went to Mikro like 15 days ago and just had a very casual, friendly, really productive conversation and we’ve had other, more formal meetings as well. And it’s bringing really fruitful things forward. The university is assisting us in addressing these off campus housing issues in a way I don’t think we have seen before and that’s very appreciated. The university is even more dedicated to putting resources into the town to help programs in three areas. They help kids, so after school programs that we’re working on that help our schools and last but not least, a program that we’ve been really expanding on that helps people that are in financial need.

Run it back: Fall Fest 2019

Quinnipiac’s student planning board and radio station, WQAQ, revamped Fall Fest this year and the new changes were a success.

WQAQ announced on Instagram that the annual concert would be undergoing some major changes. It featured free t-shirts and blankets, a mechanical pumpkin, a donut wall and three food trucks.

“WQAQ came into this year looking for new ways to expand our station into the Quinnipiac community and we identified live events and concerts as a great way to do so,” Dan Bahl, general manager. “We were approached by SPB during the spring of 2019 about the possibility of partnering for Fall Fest 2019, and that’s where the ‘new’ plan started.”

The biggest and most notable change, however, was the location. Instead of being held in South Lot like the years prior, it was held on the quad.

Students lounged on the quad as they waited for the performances to start.

“I think it’s actually a really cool set up,” Sean Raggio, senior journalism major, said. “I feel like you used to just show up, see it and go home. Now it’s an event. I think that the planning SPB did was a great job.”

The bigger venue allowed for more room to hold activities and space to lounge around and listen to music. The new location made the concert more about the event with less focus on the music and headliner.

“I like the emphasis on the festival itself and not the music and headliner,” Jamie Jean-Baptiste, a junior behavioral neuroscience major, said. “Because I feel like music is so subjective. People might not like the music act, so it’s more in terms of hanging around and just about being around people in the community.”

Fall Fest had multiple lawn games for students to play while they waited for the music performances.

The Sulls opened the show at 1 p.m., playing classics like “The Middle” by Jimmy Eat World and “Hey Ya” by OutKast. The following act was Those Guys another cover band based in New England. The headliner was Cale Dodds. Dodds is most known for his singles “Take You Back” and “What We Gonna Do About It,” which he released in 2018.

“With The Sulls and Those Guys, we picked two cover bands based in Connecticut, both of which covered a number of genres and artists that we believed the Quinnipiac community would enjoy listening to and singing along with,” Bahl said. “With Cale Dodds, we knew that people may not know his songs directly, but his sound equates to a number of high-profile pop-country artists currently performing around the country, and we believed he would bring that same energy and enthusiasm”

The Sulls opened up Fall Fest with hits from OutKast, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Greenday.

The food trucks gave out free tacos and students received a Spuds potato and ice cream for one ticket each. While the food trucks were handing out delicious food, there was also a DIY candied apple station where students were able to customize their caramel apples with sprinkles, chocolate chips and peanuts. And if that wasn’t enough, there was also a donut wall, where Fall Fest workers handed out free donuts.

“I remember mostly my first fall fest, I got a guitar pick from the Plain White T’s,” Raggio said. “I feel like it was out of your way when it was in South Lot. Now, people could just be passing through and see it. You could be going to the library and check it out.”

Students embracing the fall season by making their own caramel apples

WQAQ and SPB worked hard on bringing something fresh to the annual tradition of Fall Fest. Although there were a lot of changes to this years event, don’t expect any more major changes to next year’s concert.

“There are certain tweaks that I believe we’d like to make to the schedule of the day, and the times that artists perform,” Bahl said. “Other than that, though, a lot of the changes will just be building on ideas that worked this year.”

Fall Fest 2019: QUad edition

This year’s Fall Fest has gotten a makeover!

Quinnipiac’s student planning board and radio station, WQAQ, have teamed up to plan this year’s Fall Fest. The annual concert will be held on the Quad on Oct. 12. The vendors will start at 12 p.m. and the performances will start at 1p.m..

As always, the event will be free of charge for anyone who wants to attend. The headliner for the concert is country singer, Cale Dodds. Dodds is most known for his singles “Take You Back” and “What We Gonna Do About It,” which he released in 2018. The Sulls, a two-brother rock band from Connecticut will also take the stage at this years Fall Fest.Last but not least, the cover band Those Guys will be performing.

WQAQ announced on Instagram that the annual concert will be undergoing some major changes. One of the most notable changes is the location of the event. The concert has always been held in South Lot but this year has moved to the Quad.

There will be free food trucks during the event and an additional station where students can make their own candy apples, plus a donut wall. Another fun addition to Fall Fest is the mechanical pumpkin (Yes. Pumpkin, not bull) that students can ride.

SPB and WQAQ have made many changes in an effort to bring something special to this year’s Fall Fest. With annual concert ready to kick off the fall season, the new changes could be a refreshing twist to a Quinnipiac tradition.