Bridgeport’s Banana Split

Mayor Bill Finch is pushing this new campaign, Let’s Move Bridgeport. I’m thinking (always a dangerous thing), considering the state is moving the Bridgeport Board of Education to the back burner, maybe we should should revisit the OIB proposal to move (split up) Bridgeport into the suburbs.

Yes sir, let’s split the city into thirds in honor of former State Rep. Lee Samowitz’s request to divide the city into three suburban communities. Bridgeport as we know it will cease to exist. Everything west of Park Avenue goes to Fairfield. Everything east of the Pequonnock River goes to Stratford. Everything in between belongs to Trumbull. That collective scream you just heard came from chief executives Tim Herbst (Trumbull), John Harkins (Stratford) and Mike Tetreau (Fairfield). “Lennie, we have our own problems.”

Everyone in Hartford thought Samowitz was a crackpot when he proposed this 20 years ago. Let’s face facts, everyone from Trumbull, Stratford and Fairfield, for the most part, come from Bridgeport. The ‘burbs send Bridgeport their garbage, sewage, sick and homeless. Larry Merly, former Bridgeport City Attorney, said it best when he screamed: large-acre discriminatory zoning in the suburbs forces the heavy concentration of  tax-exempt properties, public housing and social institutions into the city. The way to preserve the suburban lifestyle is to wall up all the social problems in the city.

If we could wave a magic wand how would this impact the mayoral campaign? That would mean Mayor Bill Finch, being east of the Pequonnock along Beardsley Park, must run for mayor of Stratford and Mary-Jane Foster, who lives in Black Rock, must run for first selectman of Fairfield. That leaves Tim Herbst to fend off all comers in the rest of the city, including former Mayor Joe Ganim who lives in Easton but pines for his old job, or acts like he does.

Maybe Joe will conspire with Democratic Town Chair Mario Testa who owns a villa in Monroe for one last absentee ballot operation to conquer the entire region. Mario, put the water on the for the macaroni. Fire up the printer for the absentee ballots!