Jasmine Wright

2 days ago | valley.newhavenindependent.org | Jasmine Wright |Eugene Driscoll

ANSONIA – The new state budget includes a section that forces city officials to appear in front of an advisory committee to review finances. Mayor David Cassetti said the appearances are not necessary and that the provision is the work of state Rep. Kara Rochelle, a Democrat who represents Ansonia and Derby. He complained no one gave city officials a head’s up. “It’s all political, there’s no question about it,” Cassetti, a Republican, said.

3 days ago | notus.org | Jasmine Wright |Alex Roarty

Former White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre’s new attempt to distance herself from the Democratic Party while diagnosing its problems is landing with a thud. A vague synopsis of a new book from the former press secretary was met with jeers from her former colleagues, as it declared that Jean-Pierre had both left the Democratic Party and also written a book focused on the three weeks it took Joe Biden to drop out of the 2024 presidential race.

1 week ago | notus.org | Jasmine Wright

President Donald Trump has commuted the sentence of Larry Hoover, the infamous former gang leader from Chicago, according to a White House official. Hoover, the co-founder of Chicago gang Gangster Disciples, has been serving multiple life sentences since the 1970s. He has multiple state and federal convictions, including for murder and founding a criminal enterprise.

1 week ago | valley.newhavenindependent.org | Jasmine Wright

ANSONIA – The company which owns the River Plaza on Maple Street asked a court to cancel a planned tax auction of the shopping plaza and throw out $100,000 in blight fines. According to an April 11 lawsuit from Maple Street Plaza, LLC, the city wanted to sell the commercial plaza at 27 Maple St. in a public tax auction after the property accrued $100,838 in blight violations over three years. However, the lawsuit says the city never properly informed the company of those violations.

2 weeks ago | valley.newhavenindependent.org | Jasmine Wright

ANSONIA – Democrat Javier Varas has ended his campaign for mayor, citing family health issues. Varas, 23, had announced his campaign in March. He is also the vice chair of the Ansonia Democratic Town Committee. Varas said that he needed to withdraw to focus on his family. “Like all of you, my family is very dear to me,” Varas wrote in a prepared statement May 22.