State Funds Set For More Armory Planning

More planning for the future of the dilapidated Goffe Street Armory is on the horizon, with the help of $250,000 in state funding.

City Economic Development Administrator Mike Piscitelli offered this update alongside representatives from the Armory Community Advisory Group (known as ​“AC2”), a coalition of community members and academics, in a presentation to the aldermanic Community Development Committee at City Hall last Wednesday evening.

The group needs the Board of Alders’ permission to accept a $250,000 state Urban Act Grant to fund an additional round of planning for the vacant historic city-owned building, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and the Connecticut Freedom Trail.

At four stories and 155,000 square feet, the red-brick Goffe Street Armory, first constructed in 1930 with Romanesque-inspired arches along the facade, stands across from Goffe Street Park.

The building initially served as infrastructure for the National Guard, while doubling as a public gathering space. It has housed mayoral balls, art exhibits, and Black Expos organized by the Black Coalition of Greater New Haven — annual festivals celebrating local Black businesses and culture. The city gained control over the building in 2009 after the National Guard moved out. After a few years hosting local artists through Artspace’s Citywide Open Studios, the building officially shuttered to the public in 2018 due to dilapidation.

The Urban Act Grant is the latest step in AC2’s efforts to determine what to do with the publicly-owned building.

The organization has so far led multiple open-ended community ​“visioning” sessions where attendees could share memories and brainstorm big-picture ideas for the armory.

The next step of the planning process will involve gathering and presenting more concrete information.

According to city Deputy Economic Development Administrator Carlos Eyzaguirre and AC2 organizer Nadine Horton, the $250,000 state grant will fund an ​“economic feasibility study” (akin to the study used to redevelop the Strong School in Fair Haven) to assess how realistic some of the community’s ideas would be, as well as early design and layout analyses of the vacant building.

After about a year of this work funded by the Urban Act Grant, the committee plans to apply for a larger state Community Investment Fund (CIF) grant at the end of 2025 in order to fund actual improvements to the building.

Eyzaguirre noted that urgent repairs to stabilize the roof have been completed and the building has been secured, though robust improvements are still needed before it can be usable.

“This is an example here of the community really pushing us to be better,” reflected Eyzaguirre. ​“It’s been a challenging building for us,” given how costly the redevelopment would be. ​“But the community has pushed to keep this front and center … We feel like we might be able to see our way home here on a really significant project with major community impact.”

“There’s a lot of need, be it for community space, housing, education space… There’s enough need there that this building could potentially satisfy,” Eyzaguirre added.

Last Wednesday, the committee alders unanimously voted to recommend that their colleagues on the full Board of Alders accept the grant.

“We need to take care of that building, care for it: build it up, and think about what kind of resources we can have in it … and not just let it continuously dilapidate as it’s been doing,” said Newhallville Alder Kim Edwards.

So far, at a series of community meetings in recent years, New Haveners have proposed that the building be revived as a worker-owned grocery store and food rescue operation, a movie theater to replace the now-shuttered Bow Tie Cinema, a kid-centered sports venue, and a housing complex with supportive services, among many other ideas.

Horton is nursing an idea of her own as she helps organize these public input sessions.

She envisions the armory’s drill hall as a host for community gardens from all over the city, particularly during the winter season. ​“Imagine an indoor farmer’s market of all community gardens!” she said.

Horton founded the adjacent community garden about 8 years ago, with help from Farmer D of Root Life LLC. While she grew up a ​“city kid” without any food-growing experience, she said that after starting the neighborhood greenspace, ​“I fell completely down the gardening rabbit hole.”

Over time, Horton said, the garden has become a site of ​“more than just growing food. It’s grown people and ideas and relationships.” She said that the garden has been nurtured not only by nearby residents like herself, but by people hailing all the way from Hamden and from Yale.

Now, according to Eyzaguirre, the Yale School of Art is contracting local artist Mike DeAngelo to paint a mural along the eastern side of the armory building — the wall facing the community garden — with the help of young apprentices. The project, funded through a Yale Planetary Solutions Grant, will make use of cooling paint to reduce the building’s heat absorption.

“It’s been a real bridge builder between Yale University students and community in a very natural, non-pressurized way,” said Horton.

Horton feels particular pride when her two-year-old grandson arrives at the garden each Saturday to encounter friendly faces while gaining exposure to urban agriculture.

He’s learning to participate in a micro version of the community life that once filled the armory next door. ​“When he comes to the garden,” Horton said, ​“he runs right to the tomatoes.”