Economic Development
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The main focus of the Community Development Plan is the creation of community businesses that will support the casino complex by supplying services and/or goods. These businesses will carry seven-year contracts with the casino which should make these businesses multi-million dollar enterprises. These businesses will give job-preference first to the members of the immediate community and then to those of surrounding areas. Special job consideration will also be given to teenagers and high school students.

A Day Care Center will be introduced into each of the communities that will provide child care for working mothers and programs will be developed to help deal with the problems of teenage pregnancy, substance abuse and AIDS-addicted children. Another major component is an Elderly Center that will provide services to our elderly: a place to share their concerns and offer their knowledge to help us stabilize our community; and a place where the community can assure them that the remainder of their life will be one of dignity and respect.

Another component inside the community will be an active "Youth At Risk" program which will address the needs of our youth; one that is designed to deal with the problems of broken homes and drug and alcohol abuse complete with counseling and referral. One of the major problems facing our community directly involves our youth: murder has reached a record high in Bridgeport, many of which are youth related; drug and alcohol abuse by our youth have reached new highs and are likely causes for many of the major and minor crimes in our city. Other problems facing our youth (AIDS, teenage pregnancy, newborn infants with AIDS and drug addictions) are placing a tremendous strain on the family unit.

The last component will be a Health Clinic fashioned after the Hill Health Clinic in New Haven. These Health Clinics will offer a full range of medical assistance and maximum medical benefits to all inside the communities.

 

 

The physical outlook must change within the community. The lighting must be upgraded and expanded to allow a sense of security and be a deterrent to wholesale crime. New landscaping must be done to encourage pride of ownership, respect and a sense of well-being within the community. Outside of ordinary Block Watches, there should be a Tenant Watch built into tenants' associations, which will watch for illegal activities inside the buildings. Drugs, gangs and crime should not be tolerated. With a tenant watch program, these activities would be anonymously reported, and with a no tolerance approach supported by local and state police and the F.B.I., they would remove the criminals along with the ones involved.

The Community Building shall be repaired, refurnished, refurbished and

maintained by a team of maintenance personnel who live and work in the community.

The major problems affecting the Bridgeport Minority Community are:

1)  Crime

2)  Drug Abuse

3)  Unemployment

4)  Welfare

5)  Health Care

6)  Day Care

7)  Homelessness

8)  Economic Instability

These are problems the entire country is facing and the federal government has been unable to address. The city of Bridgeport has been unable and unwilling to focus on this issue to the point that these problems have gotten out of hand. The Golden Hill Tribe has made a true commitment to help stabilize and reduce the impact of these major issues in the minority community.

The City of Bridgeport is divided into 4 major community areas. A community development specialist will be assigned to each area and will evaluate and estimate a realistic success rate for the development of: (1) businesses that will support the casino operations. These must be businesses that will upgrade the community; that will create permanent jobs, and that will generate change by assisting law enforcement in stamping out crime and drug infestation. (2) Housing. Emphasis to be placed on development of singe-family housing that will show pride of ownership and low crime neighborhoods. The community development specialist will evaluate, assess, make recommendations and submit plans to the Review Board for review and consideration.

REVIEW BOARD

The Review Board will consist of five members to review recommendations and plans. The Review Board will submit such recommendations and plans to the Controller for financial analysis. The Controller will then determine if the plans are financially feasible and will report to the Review Board with recommendations and/or changes. The Review Board will then approve or disapprove the plans. Upon approval, the Administration will be required to find funding either through grants or low-income loans.

    The Golden Hill Tribe of the Paugussett Indian Nation Holds the Key to their Salvation and the Key to the Salvation of the Residents of the City of Bridgeport

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Only Justice Can Help Them Unlock The Door.

 

EDUCATIONAL ASSISTANCE PROGRAM

The Community Development Plan (CDP) of the Golden Hill Tribe (the Tribe) has a major emphasis on the youth of our community. One of the focal points of this is in improving the education opportunities made available in our schools.

The CDP will be refined by the Tribe in consultation with educational experts, but at this time has two major components. Both of these are aimed at improving and integrating the schools in Bridgeport. The integration will be the results of parents and students wanting to attend public school in Bridgeport.

The need for such an approach is only highlighted by the Sheff v. O'Neill case and a proposal by the state to create six educational regions in Connecticut.

Bridgeport is located in the Southwest Region, which has a thirty-five (35%) percent minority enrollment. This is the highest percentage of any of the six regions. The South Central and North Central regions each have thirty (30%) percent minorities and the other three regions have significantly lower percentages of minorities students.

The CDP can make a major impact in support of the voluntary nature of the approach which the state of Connecticut wishes to follow. First the Tribe will help fund a "magnet school" program in Bridgeport. The initial part of the concept is to create the best mathematics, science and technology high school in the State of Connecticut.

The Tribe will provide seed money to purchase the best equipment and books available anywhere in the country for high school students. In addition to a direct monetary contribution, the Tribe will hire an experienced person to contact corporations throughout Connecticut and the country to seek funding and donations of equipment.

The objective would be for the students at this school to have available all of the resources to create a nationally renowned school. The high school would not only be for college-bound students, but would also teach high-tech vocational skills, such as computer repair.

Admission to the high school would be based on competitive examinations, with a certain minimum number of seats being kept for residents of Bridgeport. To be certain that Bridgeport residents are ready for such a challenging educational environment, the program would also include assistance to middle schools, junior high schools and elementary schools. This assistance would include computers, books and scientific equipment for the younger children.

Beyond the equipment and materials, a tutoring service would be started. In addition to professional teachers and tutors, older or more advanced students who showed the proper maturity could be paid to tutor younger students. This would provide income opportunities for these older students, as well as helping prepare the younger students.

Additional training would be made available to the teachers who will be working in these schools and teaching such demanding subjects to highly motivated and intelligent students.

It is also our goal to create a second magnet school in Bridgeport which would be a school of creative and performing arts. Again, the students would be provided with the necessary instruments and equipment.

As a final "reward" for city residents who graduate from any Bridgeport public high school, the Tribe will help fund a scholarship program. There will be two parts to this program: One group of scholarships will only be available to Bridgeport residents who graduate from one of the city high schools. A second, and probably much smaller fund, will be available to graduates of the magnet schools who are not residents of the city.

There are two reasons for this: first, we presume that graduates of the magnet schools will have other scholarship funds available; second, we specifically intend to give advantages to Bridgeport residents.

The overall objective of these programs will be to draw non-minority students to the schools of Bridgeport; but perhaps just as importantly, it might even be possible that over the long range non-minority families will actually want to live in Bridgeport for the educational advantages and scholarship opportunities which are made available to their children.

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PUBLIC SAFETY PROGRAM

Public Safety will be addressed by requesting police sub-stations or mobile substations which were highlighted in the Bridgeport East End area some years ago. With assistance from the Golden Hill Tribe, funds would be provided for either mobile or permanent sub-stations in high crime areas with at least one in each project area to be staffed by a minimum of 3 to 5 city police officers with cars. These sub-stations are highly visible and emulate a constant police presence in the area. They should be manned 24 hours a day and have bilingual officers who will patrol the area.

The Golden Hill Tribe will provide funding to assist the police department in upgrading its equipment and facilities. Surveillance equipment with monitors will be installed, maintained and manned in the mobile sub-stations by police officers who practice a no tolerance policy toward drugs and gang related crime in the community. However, the community itself must adopt and practice a non-tolerance approach to crime, drugs and gang related activities.

Since the Golden Hill Tribe will providing a large portion of the funding for this program, the Tribe will negotiate an agreement with the police department regarding the hiring and training of police officers from the minority communities; the concept being to hire and train individuals from these communities who will return to stamp out crime and initiate crime prevention programs. To insure that the program is adequately funded, the Golden Hill Tribe will seek matching funds from the city, state and federal agencies.

BUSINESS VENTURES

  There will be many opportunities for businesses throughout the community to flourish as a result of the products and services required by a casino complex.

The Golden Hill Tribe will support already existing locally-owned businesses, and will encourage the development of additional businesses which can supply the products and services the casino complex will need. New or existing businesses, whether they be community, city, state or individually owned, will have the opportunity to seek financing from the Golden Hill Foundation, if they cannot receive traditional funding.

For the Golden Hill Tribe, the key to its decision to be of assistance to a business owner(s), will be the overall positive impact that business will have on community members.

There are numerous businesses that will be needed to support a casino complex, some include: tableware, food, beverage, janitorial supplies, limousine services, etc.

An example of a business need that would be ideal follows.

A Laundry

A major business venture that should produce a significant profit for the owners is an industrial and commercial laundry.

Most local cleaners send their work out to be done, especially items that are to be washed; others who send laundry out are hospitals, restaurants, nursing homes, hotels, etc. Since Bridgeport has been designated as a hopeful site for a major casino, the casino can support the laundry by contracting them for the laundry business.

The casino complex would be a major client of the laundry, including cleaning of table cloths, napkins, uniforms, sheets, pillow cases, blankets, bedspreads, etc. Other major clients could be major hospitals, nursing homes and restaurants. Of special note, hospitals and nursing homes, who use large amounts of materials that have to be cleaned, are involved with Title 19 and other state funding. Because of this, they must extend out to the minority businesses for services under the equal opportunity clauses in state funded facilities.

 The laundry enterprise would have to be owned or run by astute business people. They should have operating capital to cover its overhead for one year; contracts should be retained to make a substantial profit, but the prices should be low enough to compete with other laundries and cleaners as well as other minority owned companies.

As business progresses, prices should rise, making sure that increases in overhead are covered.

The laundry faces stiff competition from other laundering facilities, but many facilities in the area farm out their work. It is estimated that 10% to 20% of all laundry business within the community can be captured, while providing employment opportunities for the members of the Bridgeport community.

The laundry facility should begin seeking out contracts for laundry service once it has been established that the Golden Hill facility will go up. Appropriate steps must be taken to acquire equipment, determine an operating location and hire employees. It should be restated that if the casino funding is in place, Golden Hill will strongly consider underwriting the loans for this enterprise, especially since the casino will be the major contractor. If, however, those seeking to establish a laundry business decide to pursue operations before the casino complex is built, the contracting and seeking funds from traditional sources should be pursued.

This is one of many businesses that will thrive with the development of the Golden Hill Casino Complex. We look forward to the economic opportunities that we will be able to provide.

    

     


Copyright � 1999 Golden Hill Paugussett Nation