South Norwalk Council members decry ‘surprises’ in Monroe Street work

NORWALK, Conn. – Promises were made and broken during the Monroe Street improvements, two South Norwalk Common Council members say, echoing and supporting suspicions expressed by District B residents toward city officials.

Evidence suggests that the claims made by Councilwoman Sharon Stewart (D-At Large) and Councilman Travis Simms (D-District B) at last week’s District B meeting are at least partially correct.

Stewart in particular expressed indignation at the work described as “improvements” by city officials, including the bike lanes that are expected to go down the road she and Simms live on.

This put Bike/Walk Task Force Co-Chairman Mike Mushak on the spot, defending bike lanes to fellow Democrats.

“I’m going to get hit by a bicycle when I get out of my car and a bus when I get out of my driveway,” Stewart said. “You all didn’t think about us at all. We’re right there.”

“This is a surprise to me,” Mushak said in an amused tone. “I thought everybody would love it. Honestly, it’s for everybody … Low income communities across the country are dying for bike lanes and they’re putting them in. So why is South Norwalk different?”

He laughed. “Norwalk is always different, I guess,” he said.

Stewart said no one told her they were going to put speed bumps on Monroe Street.

“That’s how rumors get started. It’s a bump-out… there are no speed bumps,” Mushak said in protest as Morris banged his gavel.

“All of our issues are important. In order to respect those we have to keep order,” said Morris, who had been trying to keep the meeting moving but had allowed people to speak.

The discussion about untruthful city officials came after John Mosby suggested that officials were trying to take Lexington Street properties away from their owners. Mary Mann said no one was taking her property because she attends meeting and is involved, urging others to do the same.

“A lot of us are trying to be involved but you can’t be involved if you stand at a meeting and you ask for paperwork, you ask to have the meetings or you ask to have stuff mailed to you, and then you find out they made decisions and they never had the meeting,” Stewart said.

No one at SoNo Gardens was notified when the work was going to begin on Monroe Street, she said.

“I asked for the paperwork to let us know when to come out,” Stewart said. “They didn’t send us anything but they snuck through the back door and did everything. So if they do it that way, how can we be a part? It’s good that some people get to know but they didn’t tell us a thing.”

No one in Public Works or Redevelopment ever said anything about speed bumps (bump-outs) or a “walkway,” she said.

“Now they doing speed bumps, they’re going to do a walkway, they’re doing all kinds of stuff, but they never said a thing to us,” Stewart said. “In our Council meetings, when we vote on stuff, we didn’t know none of that stuff was going to happen because we would have spoke on it. So you can’t surprise us on stuff…. I would like them to be held accountable and for them to start notifying us, that live in that area. How they are going to come into that area that we live and just destroy everything, and think everything is OK?”

“They put things in motion behind the scenes. By the time it comes to us it is already in the works,” Simms said.

Morris asked Stewart and Simms to provide a bullet list outlining specific instances in which they were not informed by city staff of things they weren’t notified about. He would then set up a meeting with Mayor Harry Rilling, he said.

NoN investigated.

The Monroe Street work was authorized at the March 10 Council meeting. There were no details given about bump-outs (a protrusion from the sidewalk into what could be a parking space, to give pedestrians added protection from passing cars), just vague references to enhanced pedestrian safety. Redevelopment Agency Senior Project Manager Susan Sweitzer did mention that there would be a crosswalk across Monroe at the entrance to the train station, the “walkway” Stewart referred to.

Stewart questioned then-DPW Chief Hal Alvord and Sweitzer. She never asked for a meeting but pressed to have the residents notified.

“How far in advance are you going to let the folks who live in that area know what’s going on with their street?” Stewart asked Alvord.

Alvord indicated that the state was not doing the project, that his department would notify the residents. “It will be city staff managing the project,” Alvord said.

Councilman David Watts (D-District A) asked if letters would be sent.

“We’ve actually found it more effective to have an intern, a construction inspector or the contractor deliver flyers to the properties,” Alvord said. “Otherwise we have to go research, get the addresses, names, make out letters, all that kind of stuff, and the fliers we can do in a day.”

Neither Stewart nor Simms are members of the Public Works Committee. They did not attend the March 5 committee meeting in which this topic was discussed, so the full Council meeting was the extent of their discussion on the topic.

The packet for the Council meeting did not include specific information about what would be done to Monroe Street.

The beginning of the work on Monroe Street predates the involvement of interim DPW Director Bruce Chimento. Asked on Tuesday if Monroe Street residents were notified, Chimento said he had asked the staff about that.

“My people said they were all sent out of the Redevelopment Agency,” Chimento said.

“At the end of the day the Redevelopment Agency doesn’t do the construction,” Redevelopment Agency Director Tim Sheehan said Friday. “That would be DPW. … Why would we send out notices on a project that DPW is doing?”

So there’s evidence that perhaps fliers were not distributed as Alvord had said they would be.

However, Stewart was notified in an email from Sweitzer.

Sheehan provided the email, dated May 5.

RDA to Stewart

The email chain began with DPW Senior Civil Engineer Mike Yeosock, who said work would begin at the end of the week; Sweitzer forwarded his email to Norwalk Housing Authority officials and Stewart. On May 6, Stewart said she had forwarded the email to the SoNo Gardens board.

Rilling asked Alvord to retire on May 12. Alvord worked to May 15.

Morris said Friday that he has not set up a meeting with Rilling yet because he hasn’t received documentation from Simms and Stewart about the alleged incidents of misinformation. Stewart did not return a Saturday phone call.

At Monday’s meeting, Stewart questioned how there could be room for bike lanes when there are parked cars along the road.

“You’ve got buses stopping all day on both sides of that street. How are they going to be riding a bike?” Stewart asked. “… When the bus come you can’t see unless you pull all the way out (of SoNo Gardens). You don’t know how many times we almost got clipped by one of the buses. Now you’re going to have to watch out for the bikes and the buses, and now you’re going to have people go through SoNo Gardens to get there, and we don’t want them there. So that’s a problem.”

Mushak assured her there was room for bike lanes. They’re good for everyone because they slow traffic down, he said.

“I don’t know what to say, this is not the forum to hit me with this,” Mushak said, as the complaints continued.

“I went to a public meeting, you didn’t talk about that,” Stewart said. “This is the first time I heard about the bumps or anything. You’re going to put a bike lane like they did on Strawberry Hill? I think that’s a joke on Strawberry Hill.”