From Beaver Hills To City Hall: Shafiq Abdussabur

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
As promised, we head to theProject hotline looking forward to this and welcome
to the show. Chaffiq Abdussber,who has thrown his hat in the ring
he's taken on justin alokers. There'squite a few hats in that ring,
ye are there not, sir?Oh? Yes, there is all Democrats
right on the ticket to whatever.There are about five people running right now.

(00:21):
I mean, if that doesn't suggesta frustration with the present administration,
I don't know what does. Well. First of all, Bennie, thank
you for having me on the show. It's a pleasure to be here this
morning. But yeah, I meanlisten, when you have three, you
know, at least five, fouror five candidates out here running for mayor,

(00:41):
I mean, this is this isvery exciting and I do believe it
tells a story about how people feelabout the current leadership in the city.
Yeah, and now I know you'reand your background is pretty interesting too.
You've already got a political career behindyou. Were you also in law enforcement?
Oh? Yeah, I was apolice officer for the city is even

(01:02):
for twenty one and a half years. I retired as a decorated sergeant.
Um and uh I also didn't.After that, ran a multimillion dollars cleaning
and construction company in the city,and then I went on to take on
a short steps as an alder forthe Board of Alders. I got to
say, it may sound like thelike a little boy talking, but I

(01:25):
don't know that you could find abetter mayor than someone who served that city
as a police officer, uh fora few years, never mind twenty one.
I just think you know the street, you know the good areas,
the bad areas, you know thetrue stories and not the media spin.
I just think it's the best roadto city hall is being is wearing that

(01:51):
uniform. That's that's my belief,you know, kind of always was my
belief, dude. Especially I'm newNew Haven, boorn and raised, so
you know, a former past offlike I know that, I know the
streets, I know their history,the areas that have been gentrified, like
you know every nook and cranny,and an author, a police officer will

(02:12):
know that absolutely, you know,and like like you you know, I
was born and raised in the cityBehaven. I'm fifty six years old.
I grew up in various parts ofNew Haven, from fair Haven to the
Hill to Newhallville the Dicks Will tothe golf Terist area. My parents later
moved and bought a house in Westville, where my mother still lives near East
Rock, near West Rock, andnow I live. You know, I

(02:35):
lived like behind Hill House. SoI'm very aware of the inner workings of
New Haven and the different things thatyou Haven have to offer, the ups
and down in the direction that weneed to go, you know, the
vision that we need to have forNew Haven in this moment. Yeah,
you know, I might be fullof it too. Back there. I
haven't telling you like I know myNew Haven inside and out, and I
do, and I love my NewHaven. That's why it pains me sometimes

(02:58):
to be on the air here andtalking about violence prevention officers and we created
this job and the guy quits aday. It hurts. I got a
daughter driving through my beloved Elm Cityon our way to school every day,
and I wanted to be safe.But I got to be honest with you,
CHAFFI, if you don't mind mecalling me by first name. Where

(03:19):
the hell is Beaver Hills, Man, I'm born rame On Man. I
don't know bever Hills. You knowwhat it is? Beaver Hills the other
side of lagoon, man, it'sother side of lagoon. So if you
think about where the police range usedto be on Sherman Parkway, Okay,
on one side of Sherman Parkway,you have New Hallville Yeah, I know,
New Hallville Way. I never evenheard. The other side of the

(03:44):
lagoon is beaver Hills. That's CrestStreet, Okay, Green Road, Winsthrop
Avenue, uh, Norton Parkway.Yeah. Wait, so are you kind
of not? Is beaver Hills kindof knocking on here? Am dinner?
Am I all wrong? It's alittle not, kind of less. So
if you think about where Southern's campis, yes, separate, yes,

(04:08):
right, yeah, absolutely beaver Hillsbeaver Hills technically, which is technically War
twenty eight, it actually starts CrossStreet park Um to Crest the street,
crested Fish Street, Fish Street,Um, you know, or actually the
boulevard to the boulevard on to WhaleAvenue all the way down Willie Haven Orchard.

(04:29):
So think about that. Yeah,got it. When I head to
Southern from here, that's actually theway that I take from work from Radio
Tower. Spark has appost at homebecause that's where my daughter goes one.
Who you talk to, you'll giveyou different stories. But you know the
next the nextest of it is.You know, it's all of that area
passed on the other I call itthe other side of Lagoon for the other
side of Sherman Parkway leading towards theboulevard. Yeah. New Haveners like to

(04:55):
bicker over where an area specifically starts. You know. I had that growing
up. It was like Morris Coveversus the Annex. It's like, well,
this isn't you know? So Iget that. So you were the
former. You were a Beaver Hillsolder and it's interesting to talk about that
area. It's interesting to talk aboutSouthern and we're the exact same age.
I mean, you might have afew months on me. I turned fifty

(05:17):
six in June, so we goback an hour day. We walked all
over Southern. We walked from Southernpast the cemetery, down into Westville,
Blakes wherever, you know, andgot our drink on at Delaney's. And
it was comparatively speaking, considerably saferthan it is now. I got a
twenty year old daughter who if she'snot hearing the gunfire during the day,

(05:43):
she's getting a notification on her phonethat there's been a shooting and just be
aware of it as you walk toyour car. So, as a former
police officer and someone who's going afterthe mayoral seat, what would be the
first thing you would do about,you know, making the streets safer where
you know it's really sad um,you know, And it's almost embarrassing at

(06:08):
this point as a new have,as a new havener, that our marketing
tips or our marketing strategy or seemto be the brand of the Haven is
that we're constantly a city trying tofigure out a way to deal with violet,
but constantly a city trying to figureout how to deal with homelessness.
We're constantly a city trying to figureout how to deal with people on being
able to live here and afford tolive here. I mean, that's not

(06:30):
that's not the way you market acity, you know. And so the
way you do market the city isyou actually run the city in a way
a city needs to be hunt.We're down one hundred police officer. And
here's the thing about it, Vinny, when people think about, oh,
policing and policing, well, let'sget speed cameras and let's do all these
new things. Let's hire a Violet'sprevention coordinated how about we just hire a
hundred police office. Yeah, right, because because there's a thing if the

(06:55):
recipe to make a cake requires youto have two eggs in a up of
water, right in a stick ofbutter, if you take out the two
eggs, you're not going to havethe cake that you're anticipating. I'm not
promoting and I'm not advocating that wehave to have a police stay, absolutely
not. But you know what onehundred police officers could do. It could
give us more SR roles inside ofthe school system, right, and so

(07:17):
that when we have to anticipate isa mass shooting going to come to New
Haven? Are we gonna be next? What we would actually have a preventive
measure of having a police officer inthat school or driving around that school.
You know what one hundred police officerswill do. It'll give us more visitability
on the major streets of Whaley Avenue, Dicks Will Downtown where we're getting all

(07:39):
these people were hit and killed bycars, all these car accidents. Right.
So it's a reason you have thesetypes of mechanisms at it one hundred.
We're down one hundred and thirty teachers, approximately one hundred and thirty teachers
in our school system. You knowwhat one hundred and thirty teachers more in
our school system might do. Itmight actually get our children to be able

(08:00):
to read in the third and fourthgrade. Right now, we're eighty four
percent of the children in third fourthgrade can't read, the lowest performing school
district in the state of Connecticut afterCOVID. So we can't say, no,
well, it was impacted. Yes, all schools were impacted by this
pandemic, but we're past this markright and Bridgeport, Hartford, all these

(08:24):
other metros are outperforming us. Soif we want to stop the gun shot,
if we don't want to deal withthe forty one percent increase in homicides
under this administration, fifty five percentincrease and people being shot on the streets
of New Haven under this administration,the only thing that's going to replaced gunfire

(08:46):
violent crime fast is in good educationwith the opportunity that you can be somebody
one day. That's the vision Iwant to bring into That's why I'm running
from mayor. That's great stuff.You know, to your point two about
the the understaffed police department isn't awild again, deferring to the fact that
we're the same age. You knowwhen when we were in our twenties,

(09:07):
you know, in the eighties,there was a waiting list to get on
the You know, I can't evenbelieve we're at a point where where we're
begging people give it a shot therecruitment. And also we're in middle schools.
I had friends who were trying andfailing to get on, like it
was a coveted gig that hopefully youhad some names to drop. Maybe your

(09:28):
father was a cop, a littlelegacy went on. It's just such a
different game. Well, you know, here's the thing. You know,
it's all about city management. It'sall about branding, right. Why would
I want to come work for acity where it sounds so dangerous? Why
would I want to come teaching thecity that it sounds so dangerous and people
are not being supported. City Hallis the management mechanism for civil servants.

(09:50):
Why am I running for mayor inNew Haven? I am a career,
lifelong civil servant. I'm not acareer politician. Yeah, I'm not running
for mayor to be a career politician. My great grandfather helped build a que
bridge. My grandfather worked in astewage plant in the garbage stump. My
father was a mailman. My motherran a daycare okay until she was able

(10:13):
to save up enough money and buythat daycare and own it herself. I
was a police officer. My sonis a police officer. He bought the
house next door, in the sameneighborhood, next to the same house that
he grew up and as a kid, I'm a New Havener, Benny,
I'm you. I'm your grandfather,I'm your grandparent. This is how we're
going to rebuild New Haven to showthat character and that culture of who we

(10:37):
are as a city of civil servant. That's what we've always been, and
that's how we're gonna put New Havenback together. Three hundred and eighty seven
jobs right now unstilled in the cityin Haven. One hundred and twelve city
jobs down at city Hall, onehundred and twelve jobs. And those again
we talk about and we're coveted gigs. Those were gigs. You know.
I graduated high school, I hadfriends. There was no college. It

(10:58):
was I want to at his cityjob. The pension they were the commited
gigs man. They weren't. Sowe're doing something wrong. Well, we're
not doing something wrong. We're doingthe right thing. Okay, where we
went wrong. Where we went wrongis right now. The leadership is going
wrong because they're not hiring the people. Let me tell you this vine.

(11:20):
I was with two friends of minefrom the AID and we went to schools
in the fifth grade. Right,two of them, mine was with the
other night. One is an attorney, a prominent attorney. The other one
is very well established business New Havenbusiness owner. The prominent attorney told me
my father when we were growing up, Shafiq, he was the head of

(11:43):
the parks department. For us tobe laved. The other one said,
Shafik, when we was growing up, my father was the head of traffic
in part. And you know whatI said, This is like, this
is like back to the future.Imagine if your father wasn't depart to list
get a civil service job. Imagineif your father wasn't the traffic in practice,
so you guys wouldn't be what youare today. Their parents working for
the city gained him an opportunity tobe successful. We are robbing young people

(12:07):
in this city, right now ofthat successful opportunity. By not doing those
hundred and twelve jobs, by notfilling one hundred police officers jobs, by
not doing one hundred and thirty teacherjob sixty peer professional teacher, peer professional
job sixty school security jobs. Theseare jobs and they're New Haveners. Yes,
New Haveners rely on them for theirsustenance. They rely on them to

(12:30):
build the future of their children.They rely on to build the future to
their family. And we rely onthose jobs to maintain and flourish the system
of delivering us those resources. That'swhat we pay for what our tax Yeah,
you know, and for me itboils down to two. And this
might be silly, but you geta guy like Ali Curan here, who

(12:50):
you know, he's not born inre Easton, and I know you can't
always get that, but it's beenit's been too much. I've run into
this too much doing doing talk ratego here in New Haven, where I'm
born and raised. These people whomove here from Massachusetts from somewhere else,
even my childhood stomping grounds of MorrisCold. I hear from people who are
like, I see what it couldbe, and it's like, well,

(13:13):
I know what it was. Sothere's this fight between what one person sees
this place can be. Okay,that means correct, and versus guys like
me and you are like we justwanted to be what it was, which
it can be again, and thatworked. So here's the thing to me.

(13:33):
You know, I welcome everybody tothis city, whether you was born
and raised here, whether you livehere, whether you came here yesterday.
Here's all I want you to do. I want you to be committed.
I want you to believe in thespirit of Newhaven. I want you to
embrace the cultures of Newhaven. Iwant you to bring people together all the
time. Has to be your toppriority, unifying this city. Unfortunately,
under this administration that is not apriority. But I have grandchildren here,

(13:58):
and you know, when I decidedto run, I said, look,
I'm gonna run the mayor and hemight talk to a couple of people us
to listen, you know, justgive it a chance. Mayor won't be
here long he's looking to go toWashington or some other position, or whatever
the case might be. If themayor decided that he's gonna stay here and
raise his grandchildren, I think hewould do a better job at what he's
doing. But it's very clear whyyou look at what happened with the airport

(14:18):
over and essure that no one thatwants to live here and raise their grandchildren.
That's the mayor would make a movelike that. You wouldn't make a
move and expand an airport and ahistorical neighborhood like that, a cultural neighborhood
like that where people, you know, people bought the houses thirty four years
ago, Vinnie, you know thatshould know that when me and you were

(14:39):
going to the lighthouse. Yea,these people were living here. Now you
here coming out of city Hall.Well, they should have thought about that
before they before they bought a house. They should have never bought a house
near an airport. Well, Vinny, you know what, when I was
five years old and my mother wastaking me over to the beach over there
to fish, there was no reallybig airport. There was Testna plane.
Yeah right, you could barely hearthem taken off. I'm born on Shortham

(15:00):
Road, three blocks from tweet newHaven Airport. I mean that's where I
grew up. You know this isnot you're nailing it, you know,
you know, I can't believe howmuch the uh you know about that area
too, considering I have no ideawhere beaver Hills is, but Hills later
on today and chaffee abducber. Iappreciate you coming on. You gotta what

(15:24):
I think. I think. I'mgonna endorse you. I don't know if
you want it. I love it. Say keep your endorsement, juice.
I appreciate it. Don't announce tothat. I'll take your orman. Man.
We got an online campaign indorsement,man, I come down into compitt
you with you. We'll put iton our website. This is a This
is a campaign about people. Thisis not a campaign about politics. This
is this is a campaign about collaboration, not about color, okay, This

(15:48):
is about campaign about reason, notabout religion. Okay. This is how
we're gonna maintain our sovereignty and NewHaven is coming together and celebrating our differences
in the unity of who we arein this of our great grand parents who
fought, who fought some of themand died so that we could be successful,
to have a chance in this city. That's where I'm running from me.
It's great stuff. I appreciate youtaking the time to come on today.

(16:10):
We definitely got to get you backon as we get closer. May
make it a regular thing. ShafiqAbduciber again, what a lively conversation and
so much in common too. Makesure you're checking them out. Vote Schaffiq
that's the website. It's s ha f i q Real Housewives of Beaver
Hills. Sounds like it would bea hot show. I don't know,
Maybe I might chop it to CEPTV.