Updated: Malloy scraps state bond proposal for New Haven center after controversy

The Courant was able to get in touch with the group that owns the New Haven Peoples Center, as well as a veterans’ group that had opposed funding the center’s renovation with state dollars. Their comments are in the updated version of the story below:

A proposal to use state money for a New Haven community center that includes a tenant affiliated with the Communist Party was blocked Monday following objections from two Republican leaders as well as veterans.

The $300,000 in state bond money for improvements to the New Haven Peoples Center had been opposed by state Sen. Andrew Roraback, R-Goshen, and state Rep. Sean Williams, R-Watertown because the building houses a bureau of People’s World, a Communist Party newspaper. They said the state shouldn’t fund any project that is connected to partisan group.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy, who runs the State Bond Commission panel, said Monday that panel members would not vote on it because of the controversy surrounding the renovation project, as well as push back from veterans.

“I am particularly concerned about the opposition of veteran groups and want to take that into consideration, so therefore I’ve decided that we should not go forward with this project,” said Malloy, a Democrat. “There are some important activities that occur in this building in question, I don’t deny that, but at this time they should find other ways to support those projects.”

Click below to listen to Malloy’s remarks from the Bond Commission meeting:

Malloy did not say which veterans’ groups had approached him about the proposal. But last week, state Sen. Len Suzio, R-Meriden, held a news conference in Waterbury with several members of the Veterans of Foreign Wars at which he signaled his opposition to the project. And members of the Waterbury-based Rat Pack Motorcycle Club blocked the entrance to the Peoples Center last week. 

“It’s a free country, and I wouldn’t have it any other way,” VFW District Commander Greg Smith, of Milford, said in an email Monday. “But having seen first-hand the devastation and misery that communism has brought to the world, I’m glad Hartford relented and decided not to help fund the Connecticut version with hard-earned taxpayer money.”

The People’s World has not returned several messages left for their bureau by the Courant.

Al Marder, president of Progressive Education and Research Associates, which owns the Peoples Center, has denied that his group was connected to the Communist Party.

The New Haven Peoples Center (37 Howe Street). Photo from New Haven Town Assessor

Marder, who served in the Army in World War II, said that veterans who opposed the project were “misguided.” He said the center’s board has yet to discuss other sources of funding, but he said the center would not ask the People’s World to leave the building.

“Of course not,” he said. “We do not engage in McCarthyist (sic) witch hunts. This is a phony, distracting, diversionary issue.”

Marder has previously said that opponents to the renovation, including the conservative-leaning Yankee Institute, were using “red-baiting” tactics to bring negative attention to to the project.

The an investigative reporter for the Yankee Institute had written about the Peoples Center project in late April. Malloy pulled the Peoples Center item from the Bond Commission agenda for that day, saying the issue needed more consideration.

On Monday, Yankee Institute Executive Director Fergus Cullen sent an email to reporters with the subject line “Victory over Connecticut Communists” in which he said: “This issue has never really been about the Connecticut Communist Party.”

Cullen said the Peoples Center controversy highlighted the need for more transparency within the Bond Commission, but he praised Malloy’s action.

“It’s never too late to make the right decision, and the Yankee Institute applauds Governor Malloy for having the courage to change his mind,” he said.

Ben Barnes, secretary of the office of policy and management, said last week that the bond money would have been used to repair the roof, floor, foundation and exterior of the center’s building, which was erected in 1851.

Several groups besides the Communist newspaper have office space at the Peoples Center, including the Greater New Haven Peace Center and Unidad Latina en Accion, a group that calls for higher wages for minority workers.

State Sen. Toni Harp, who brought the Peoples Center proposal to the Bond Commission six months ago, said she was “perplexed” by Malloy’s move. She said the Bond Commission should have funded renovations to the building because of its historical value and not considered the political beliefs of its tenants.

“I don’t think that means the state supports communism” to fund the project, said Harp, D-New Haven. “I just don’t see them as a threat to anything.”