By Susan Reynolds
On Saturday, November 15th, Capitol Towers Community Outreach held their monthly meeting. During our October meeting, it was decided that the Hartford Delegation would be the invited guests. Handwritten invitations were delivered to the Legislative Office Building for the following: John Fonfara, Doug McCory, Minnie Gonzalez, Matthew Ritter, Joshua Hall, Julio Concepcion, Maryam Khan and James Sanchez. Calendar invites were then sent to the same legislators’ CT.gov emails as a follow up. Next, we did the same for Hartford Mayor, Arunan Arulampalam. Minnie Gonzalez is the only Hartford Delegate that responded to the calendar invite at all, her response being, ‘Yes’, that she would attend. She did not! Equally disappointing, the Mayor’s people reached out to us and they let us know that the Mayor would stop by, however, at 4:21 pm Saturday, the Mayor’s people contacted us at the last minute to apologize and explain that something had come up.
On Saturday, residents entered an empty room with not 1 invited guest in attendance.
We moved on and held our meeting without the Hartford Delegation. The discussion revolved around how Seniors living in Hartford feel unseen, unheard and forgotten. Emotions that continue to be voiced frequently in our Senior Community. Resident concerns now include that those who have the responsibility to make change, do not care enough about seniors to do so. I am back at my desk this afternoon saddened due to the lack of response from Hartford Leadership, and angry that the result is the same. We realized that what has been spoken in our Senior Community is true. We are Unseen and Unheard.
Some residents may not come to another meeting as they don’t believe that anyone will ever care. Others feel that if we continue to build the voice of Seniors In Hartford and the Greater Hartford area perhaps a future meeting will produce the invited guests to have a discussion on concerns that the Senior Community has. The following is an excerpt from a piece that was written by CTOC Leader Susan Reynolds and intended for our guests to hear:
“A Concern of the Senior Community
In 2025 the estimated population of Hartford is 122,544. It is estimated that 24.1% or 29,545 individuals are over 55. If you google the percentage of Hartford residents by age. Seniors 55 and over are the largest demographic of city residents. Yet they are the most ignored segment of the population in our present society. In the words of CTOC Leader Talia Orr, “We Seniors are Unseen and Unheard, and we are tired of it.”
Along with being the largest demographic in the city. They are also the largest growing demographic of unhoused individuals in Connecticut. The unhoused population in Connecticut is 3735. The population of unhoused people 55 and over is 1357. Again, the largest demographic. In fact in this last count the increase of unhoused individuals 64 and over was 33%. It was a 10% increase for 55 -64. This increase is since the unhoused count in 2024. In 2025 134 unhoused people died 51 were 55 and older. That is 38% of the unhoused individuals who died this year. Again, the largest demographic. Let that sink in for a minute. In every category – The Unseen and Unheard are the largest demographic. They are not who are always portrayed as unhoused. No, it’s one of your parents, maybe your grandparents, maybe even a brother or sister. How did this happen? Job Loss, fixed incomes, lack of affordable housing and the cost of living. Imagine working hard all your life and you get to retirement and you’re now sleeping under a bridge, in a shelter or on a friend’s couch.
Chronic homelessness costs an average of 40,440 a year. That includes the cost of a bed in a shelter and other public resources – such as hospitals and prisons. Here we go again! Prisons being seen as a public resource. HB6361 definitely needs to be moved from the Judiciary Committee back to the floor. Prison should never be seen as a public resource. Permanent supportive housing costs an average of 24,158.00 a year. This cost includes various education and counseling services. Then there is subsidized housing. For instance, subsiding me for a year costs 15,528.00. Simple, affordable housing costs the community, the city, the state and the country less than trying to put a bandage on homelessness. The city of Hartford has a tendency to throw away not only residents, but buildings too. Hartford currently has approximately 350 blighted buildings, most haven’t been sold or restored.
When my kids were growing up in the late 90’s early 2000’s the Jewel Street YMCA was a part of their life. Either their before and after school programs were run by the Y or like all other Hartford youth they spent a week or 2 in the summer at the Jewel Street Y. In my memory it seemed that even though the Y was downtown it was part of everyday life if you had children. The Y helped solidify the community in Hartford. Y’all might have had nothing in common except the Y’s programs. I am pretty sure that there are thirty somethings out there that have found memories of their time in Y programs. At that time the Y was a community builder.
At some point around 2003, the Y started talking about getting out transient housing and opening branches in the North and South Ends. In 2009 the Wilson-Gray Y was opened in the Clay Arsenal Neighborhood. A South End branch never moved past thoughts of. Northland’s plan was to tear down the building replacing it with a high rise of 200 condos. The number of condos and the number of floors changes in each retelling. Some say that originally Northland said that it was to be 11 floors but later stories said it would be 40 floors. There were also rumors that as soon as Hartford 21 was completed Northland would start on the Jewel St property […] Here we are 17 years later and prime property across from Bushnell park is still vacant. The way we see it, the city is allowing Northland to allow this building to remain vacant downtown, most likely deteriorating inside, and Hartford residents don’t understand why that is happening. The city of Hartford has had 4 different mayors since then and no one says anything about the Jewel Street property.
Picture this – The Jewel of Hartford, a subsidized senior independent living community. A model of what a subsidized senior community will look like in the future. A Senior Community where individuals will be able to “Age in Place”. A community that will have a pool and gym, multiple community rooms, and a full-time nurse for residents. There is a ton of office space, and partners in this endeavor would put out RFP’s looking for businesses who supply services to the senior community, enabling them to continue this new style known as “Aging in Place”. Having services like these in the building, as paying tenants, would ultimately result in new revenue for both the city and state. Isn’t it time we brought that building back to life, back to revolving around the community it once was? It could be the Jewel of Hartford.
Let’s take the next steps and form a committee consisting of state legislators, city officials, senior community members and any other potential partner, perhaps representatives from Hartford Hospital or UConn. If you have a story you want to share or you want to become involved in an organization that represents you as a Senior and a Hartford resident, there are 3 ways you can contact us:
- Join our Facebook Group – Seniors in Hartford Organizing for Power
- Email us at – capitoltowerscommunityoutreach@gmail.com
- Call us at – 860-515-8470 if no one answers, leave a message.
In 2026, we will change the narrative in Hartford. Let’s build an organization that represents Seniors run by Seniors looking out for the best interest of Seniors. Let’s build our Voice!
