Hartford Business Journal

14 Hartford Business Journal • December 12, 2016 www.HartfordBusiness.com Food markets sprouting in downtown Hartford By Gregory Seay gseay@HartfordBusiness.com F rom next to no downtown food mar- kets just a decade ago, Hartford's cen- tral business district is now up to at least five — and counting. In July, landlord Bruce Becker enabled The Greenway Market to open doors in about 2,400 square feet in his retail annex on Asylum Street, linked to his 777 Main apartment tower downtown. That occurred after the owner-operator of five-year-old New York Market & Deli — formerly Al's Market — farther down Asy- lum opened two other storefronts at 242 Trumbull St. and 1 Constitution Plaza. In recent weeks, Sam's Food Stores, a Rocky Hill convenience-store chain, signed a lease on 4,781 square feet of ground-floor storefront space at The Lofts At Main & Temple, 892 Main St. According to an official with landlord Marc S. Levine Real Estate Interests, the former Citibank branch office will open as an "upscale convenience store" in early 2017. Sam's Food didn't respond to repeated requests for comment. That was news to operators of downtown's existing food markets, who say they hadn't yet gotten word about the fresh competition. City officials, too, say they haven't heard from Sam's Food about its plan for a downtown market, but welcome the development. The growing number of food markets in downtown Hartford, officials say, reflects the rising population of downtown workers and full-time residents, drawn to the more than 1,000 new apartments that have opened in the city. Sean Fitzpatrick, the city's development director, said that given the number of new apartments built or under development down- town, the central district is nowhere near the point where it has too many food markets. Next fall, UConn will bring more than 2,300 more hungry students, professors and staff to downtown Hartford, with the open- ing of its new downtown campus on Pros- pect Street, next door to the Front Street entertainment/restaurant district. Meantime, the embattled developer of Hartford's Dunkin' Donuts Park, as part of the Downtown North redevelopment, has previ- ously proposed opening a supermarket in tandem with office space and condominiums. However, those plans appear stalled amid clouds over Centerplan Development's troubles finishing the ballpark on time and on budget. Some say that talks about a downtown Hartford supermarket are premature. The "urban grocery store format is rap- idly evolving,'' Michael Freimuth, executive director of the Capital Region Development Authority, the state partner in the city's and region's redevelopment efforts, said via email. "The mega food store isn't practical in a downtown setting. … Too many parking and logistical concerns.'' "Perhaps when we achieve a greater downtown population, more near 5,000, a larger grocery store will evolve,'' Freimuth said. "In the interim, the small stores are fill- ing a void that is growing due to residential activity over the last two years." Actually, the relatively small sizes of many of the new downtown apartments, he says, means little space is available for storing canned and dry foods, paper products and other grocery items. That means apartment occupants must make frequent stops at the local market to keep their cupboards stocked. The Greenway Market owner Ankit Harpaldas says that since he opened the store July 21, he has expanded its offerings of fresh and organic produce and meats, along with other staples, in response to con- sumer demand. But he said he too doubts the time is right for a full-service supermarket. In 2011, The Market at Hartford 21 opened on the Asylum Street side of the high-rise apartments, cater- ing to its residents with fresh produce, meats and prepared foods. But within months, the grocery, in which the city had reportedly invested more than $400,000, closed. "If I were to be very honest,'' said Harpal- das, who also owns Capital Spirits package store on downtown's Pratt Street, "being into the business now, and seeing it first hand, I don't think it's sustainable yet.'' "In time, Hartford will need one, too,'' Harpaldas said of a full-service supermar- ket. "We really, really, really try to make it so our customers don't feel they have to go to a supermarket. Who knows, maybe we'll be the ones to make Greenway Market [Hart- ford's] supermarket.'' n Think tanks clash on state, private-sector pay disparities By Patricia Daddona pdaddona@HartfordBusiness.com D o Connecticut state employees receive significantly higher pay than similarly qualified private-sector workers? The answer was yes, according to a 2015 study by Connecticut's conservative Yankee Institute for Public Policy, but the group's find- ings are now being challenged by a left-leaning Washington, D.C.-based think tank. In Oct. 2015, the Yankee Institute released a report entitled, "Unequal Pay: Public vs. Pri- vate Sector Compensation in Connecticut," by Andrew Biggs, a resident scholar at the Ameri- can Enterprise Institute. In it, Biggs said total compensation for Connecticut state employees, including pay and benefits, exceeds compensa- tion for similarly qualified non-government workers in the state by at least 25 percent. But last week, in a report entitled, "Unequal public-sector pay in Connecticut? Yes — taxpayers are getting a bargain!", the Economic Policy Institute's Monique Mor- rissey takes the Yankee study to task, say- ing its findings don't square with research that shows public-sector workers typically receive compensation lower than or equal to comparable private-sector workers. Those lower salaries, however, may be offset by better benefits, she said. The EPI report argues that Biggs' find- ings are "cherry-picked," excluding larger groups that receive less compensation, such as teachers and local government employees. Public-safety personnel are also excluded from the Yankee study, Morrissey says. The Connecticut AFL-CIO, which repre- sents approximately 200,000 union members in the state, quickly seized on the EPI report findings. About half of its members are pub- lic-sector workers and half work in the pri- vate sector, a union spokesman said. "Connecticut legislators don't need Wall Street and corporate bias to build a fair economy that works for everyone," said Lori J. Pelletier, president of the Connecticut AFL-CIO. "What they need is reliable information, and once again the Yankee Institute has failed miserably." Biggs disputed the EPI report's interpre- tation of his study and defended his meth- odology. Including public-safety workers, whose dangerous jobs require higher pay, for instance, would skew results, he said. "There's no cherry picking there," he said. "What I'm doing is pretty clearly laid out. They are throwing the kitchen sink at this. There may be honest differences but on these issues I am confident on the results." Carol Platt Liebau, president of the Yankee Institute, added: "The purpose of this report was to look specifically at state employees, rather than local ones, because Connecticut is in a desperate budget mess. We are seeking common sense ways to address that mess; state- employee compensation is an obvious place to start — especially when state pension payments alone consume 10 percent of the state budget." n H B J P H O T O S | G R E G O R Y S E A Y P H O T O | H B J F I L E Customers inside The Greenway Market, 71 Asylum St., which has boosted its offerings of fresh and organic produce and meats since opening in July. Rocky Hill retailer Sam's Food Stores Inc. has leased the former Citibank branch on the ground floor of The Lofts At Main & Temple, 892 Main St., in which to open a downtown market in early 2017.

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