by Thomas Breen The New Haven independent
“It’s the end of an era. It truly is the end of an era.”
That was the first thought that came to mind Friday morning for former Board of Alders President Tomas Reyes, Jr. when he learned that Annie Boyd — a fixture of the Hill neighborhood and a towering figure in civic life dating back to her early activism in the 1960s with the New Haven chapter of the Black Panther Party — has died at the age of 80.
Boyd’s son Howard confirmed that his mother died at Yale New Haven Hospital on Thursday night after battling a number of health complications.
A native of South Carolina and mother of nine, she was a leading voice in the Hill for decades on everything from housing to education to social justice.
Throughout her career, Boyd served in numerous leadership roles, including as chair of Project MORE, president of the Hill Development Corporation and National Housing Group, site manager of West Street Housing Association, and member of the New Haven Democratic Town Committee. She also contributed to the Hill North Management Team and Mayor Toni Harp’s community policing task force.
Though she never held elected office herself, Boyd worked closely with seemingly every major political figure in New Haven, and in particular in the Hill, from the 1960s on, including State Rep. Walter Brooks, Mayor Toni Harp, and Board of Alders President Tomas Reyes, who long represented the Hill’s Ward 4 on the Board of Alders.
“She had a very unique way about her. She would bring people together without us really knowing” that’s what she was doing, Reyes said on Friday.
Even though “those times were tough,” with “the Latin Kings, the drug dealing going around, she would always walk through it and identify the good party for the community.”
He recalled working with Boyd and developer Marvin Gold in the early 1970s to put together the political support and financing for the creation of the Columbus West affordable housing complex off of Thorn Street that Boyd lived in for the rest of her life.
“It was a pretty rough political go at it because the city really hadn’t done that kind of massive low-income development in a while,” he said. “We put a package together with Marvin that was impossible not to be for.”
Her son Howard and current Ward 4 Alder Evelyn Rodriguez pointed to that same persistence as key to a life well lived, a life dedicated to family and community and New Haven.
“She always believed in family, unity, and continuing the fight for what’s right,” Howard said. “That was her thing,” whether it be related to housing, healthcare, economic development, public library access, or hosting free ice cream days in the community or free breakfast programs with the Black Panthers.
“She was strong,” Howard said. “She got the community involved.”
Evelyn Rodriguez pointed to a street naming ceremony this past summer that honored Boyd’s life and legacy by renaming the corner of Congress Avenue and West Street as“Annie Louise Boyd Corner.“
“Annie was a beautiful, gifted, spiritual, powerful woman of color with integrity, generosity, and an inspiration to many,” Rodriguez said. “She was a giant and a hero and she invoked power to the people and demanded better for direct services at the neighborhood level.”
She made sure that elected officials were held accountable to the communities they served, and she would always open her door to talk with anyone interested, even if she disagreed with them.
Rodriguez recalled first learning about Boyd’s work in the community when Boyd helped Rodriguez’s eldest sister get a job after becoming the first in the family to graduate from what was then called South Central College, and is now Gateway. Rodriguez said that she and Boyd became closer and closer when Rodriguez was Ward 4 Democratic co-chair and then alder. “She became kind of a like my mentor.”
Rodriguez said that Boyd’s legacy lives on in part through her children, many of whom remain active in Hill community life to this day. She praised Howard for all of his work leading the Hill North Community Management Team and her son Ray for helping the formerly incarcerated reintegrate into society and her daughter Valerie for all of her work supporting foster children, among other examples of public and private service.