Post-Occupy Clean-Up Will Cost $25K

by Thomas MacMillan | Apr 11, 2012 7:42 am

(14) Comments | Commenting has been closed | E-mail the Author

Posted to: Parks, Downtown, Occupy Wall Street

The city will have to shell out thousands of dollars to fix Occupy New Haven’s damage to the Green, if and when it succeeds in removing the protest camp, according to city Chief Administrative Officer Rob Smuts. The total cost for rehabilitating the Green will be approximately $25,000, Smuts said on Monday. That includes seeding new grass where the six-month-old camp has worn away all the greenery. It also includes aerating and testing the soil and checking and treating trees and roots for damage, Smuts said. The Occupy New Haven camp has held a patch of ground on the upper Green since Oct. 15, 2011. It has thwarted several attempts by the city to remove it. Most recently, on Tuesday, the city was forced to withdraw dozens of employees with heavy equipment who had already begun dismantling the camp after a federal appeals court in New York issued a restraining order. The city has made damage to the Green a central argument in its case for the removal of occupiers. At a March 28 hearing, lawyers for the city told federal Judge Mark Kravitz that the occupiers are threatening the health of the trees on the Green by tying things to them and compressing their roots. Besides the $25,000 figure, Smuts offered several other numbers Tuesday, including that the city spent an estimated $2,307.84 in police overtime for Tuesday’s aborted eviction proceedings on the Green. The city has so far spent, very roughly, about $65,000 in police overtime associated with Occupy since the beginning of the camp, Smuts said. Plus, the city has spent about $2,000 per month on port-o-lets and trash removal, Smuts said.

Share this story with others.

Post a Comment

Commenting has closed for this entry

Comments

posted by: Miss E on April 11, 2012 7:50am And that is our money.. I didn’t spend one night on the green but I have to pay to clean up after these people?

posted by: cedarhillresident! on April 11, 2012 8:26am Rob how about legal fees, are any associated with it?

posted by: RCguy on April 11, 2012 8:49am Wahhhh! Maybe we should call the Wahhhhhmbulance :[

posted by: smackfu on April 11, 2012 9:20am You’d think you could buy sod for $25k.

posted by: davecoon on April 11, 2012 10:31am The real 99% get to pick up the tab, i.e., New Haven’s taxpayers. You know, the working poor and middle class.

That being said, I actually believe this is a small price to pay to see democracy play out. I’m glad New Haven isn’t a total police state like elsewhere in the country.

posted by: Doug Hausladen On Sunday April 22nd - some friends of the New Haven Green will be hosting a cleanup on the New Haven Green from 12:30-3:30. We will meet in front of Trinity Church - bags, rakes, etc will be provided (more are welcome!) Please mark your calendars, and come out to help clean the Green! IF you have any questions - please don’t hesitate to email - .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

posted by: Curious on April 11, 2012 10:57am So over $100,000 for Occupy to play out their little drama. I hope everyone who criticized myself and others who worried about the cost of this months ago will read this, and see we were not off-base. So since DeStefano is letting Occupy stay even LONGER, and not evicting everyone but those eight people named in the proceedings, I expect him to personally pitch in and pay for this. Or maybe it can come out of the assets of the Proprietors, since they let this carry on for so long. Why should the taxpayers shell out money for the Proprietors to have entertained this little experiment?

posted by: Curious on April 11, 2012 11:00am ***The city spent an estimated $2,307.84 in police overtime for Tuesday’s aborted eviction proceedings on the Green*** This is just poor management by DeStefano and his staff. Maybe $2,300 isn’t a lot of money to them. Where is the outrage over this? Are people so complacent over this administration that they sit back and take this without a peep?

posted by: bulldog on April 11, 2012 11:34am LET YALE PAY FOR IT. THEY WANT THEM OUT MAKE THEM PAY…..........

posted by: nh104 on April 11, 2012 11:47am Doug whats left to rake besides dirt? The city just needs to go in there start writing tickets for litter, parking their mopeds/scooters on the green, trespassing, drinking, park after dusk, anything. They will start to leave on their own when tickets and summons start being handed out.

posted by: cnr146 on April 11, 2012 12:25pm Absurdly overinflated figure lacking any supporting documentation. Furthermore, the City, and not the Occupiers, is the only actor to be blamed for its choice to spend vast and unnecessary amounts of money on police and “tree root checking.”

posted by: Webblog1 on April 11, 2012 1:31pm “Besides Calabresi, the Proprietors include Chairman Days, a Yale law professor emeritus and former Clinton Administration Solicitor General, and a lifelong civil-rights activist and the first African-American member of the group; U.S. District Court Judge Janet Bond Arterton, who made a career in private practice defending workers’ rights; Albertus Magnus President Julia McNamara; and retired banker Robert Dannies.

You rarely hear about the group. It doesn’t issue press releases or give public talks or invite the public to observe its work. Its unpaid members do feel they are fulfilling a civic duty to preserve an important public space in the public interest.

They meet quarterly at the New Haven Museum (formerly the New Haven Colony Historical Society) to decide major issues involving the Green. Otherwise they leave it to the city to police the Green and make day-to-day decisions about permits and uses”. It is clear, ownership has been established,

Rob Smuts needs to forward all bills and receipts to the Proprietors, post haste, and close this awful chapter orchestrated by

DeStefano

posted by: Curious on April 11, 2012 1:42pm Rob Smuts, you read these. Any counter to the claim that the number is inflated, and without documentation to support it?