Ethan Wolin, Contributing Photographer

Mayor Justin Elicker discussed the difficulty of tackling long-term goals for New Haven and unforeseen short-term problems while encountering that difficulty as he fielded questions from Yale students on Thursday afternoon.

During an hourlong tea at Pauli Murray College, with roughly two dozen undergraduates in attendance, Elicker spoke in candid terms about the challenges of the job he has held for almost five years. He also touted New Haven’s recent growth and answered pointed questions about particular residents who have complained of mistreatment by the city.

“Every day it’s like putting out fires, and you don’t have as much time to kind of step back and think big picture,” Elicker said, before describing his vision for inclusive growth. “Our city is at an inflection point where we are growing rapidly, and it would be a beautiful thing if, as we grew, we didn’t gentrify and just push people out.”

He mentioned his goal of bringing New Haven’s population to 150,000, from about 138,000 today, in the next decade. He said he would seek further investment from Yale, adding that President Maurie McInnis has been “saying the right things” in their conversations so far.

After Head of College Tina Lu introduced the mayor, Elicker began by encouraging the students to invest themselves in New Haven activities and neighborhoods beyond the University.

Elicker quipped, before calling on students, “I only answer easy questions.” But he repeatedly remarked that the students’ queries were hard or, in the case of the first one, “the most impossible question”: how he makes decisions as mayor, balancing constituent input, expert advice and his own instincts.

When officials consider public opinion, he said, “oftentimes they’re referring to people that show up at a meeting and are the squeaky wheel.” Elicker added, “We’re too responsive to the people that are loud, and don’t take as much time to step back and say, ‘What is the fair and appropriate and right policy?’”

Two students read aloud pre-written questions from members of the activist group U-ACT, the Unhoused Activist Community Team. One of them relayed a message from Joel Nieves, who lives in a tiny home in the Hill that now violates zoning rules. The message insinuated that Elicker had tried to kick him out of New Haven because of his past criticism of the government.

“I’m aware of his case, and I’m saddened to hear that anyone thinks that we have any policy like that,” Elicker said, explaining that Nieves declined a proposed housing option in Branford. “It almost makes me want to cry. How is it that Mr. Nieves thinks that?”

Nieves previously told the News that he had rejected the city’s offer because leaving New Haven risked hurting his mental health.

A handful of non-student protesters, affiliated with U-ACT, greeted Elicker outside Lu’s residence, where the tea took place. One poster called for the release of Robert Cardone Jr., a homeless New Havener who was jailed almost four weeks ago after three empty metal canisters he left near municipal buildings downtown aroused a mistaken bomb scare. A student questioner brought up Cardone at the tea.

“We are of the position that Mayor Elicker has declared war on people that are unhoused,” U-ACT organizer Billy Bromage, one of the demonstrators, told the News. “He has not addressed the bottom-line issue that people need a safe place to stay.”

Inside, another student pressed Elicker to explain his approach to the tiny home community, which includes Nieves, in the backyard of the Amistad Catholic Worker House on Rosette Street. New Haven cut off the homes’ electricity in July after a temporary permit expired, leaving the structures in violation of zoning regulations.

In a nine-minute reply, Elicker justified the zoning enforcement by citing the community input that shaped the neighborhood’s restrictions, as well as the liability that the city and its inspectors can face after knowingly neglecting to enforce the code.

Lu told the News that Elicker had previously participated in a Pauli Murray tea in early 2020, before the pandemic began, and before nearly all current undergraduates arrived at Yale. Before moving to her residence in Murray, Lu said, she knew Elicker as a fellow East Rock resident.

“This was actually, for me, a model of civic engagement — such intelligent and informed questions and a public servant who came up here and is really ready to engage,” Lu told the audience at the end of the event.

In 2010, Elicker received a joint degree from the School of Management and the School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, now called the School of the Environment.

Tyson Odermann contributed reporting.