A developer is bringing a fresh approach to projects in a CT city, with ‘a quality and newness.’
By Kenneth R. Gosselin, Hartford Courant Published Wednesday, March 10, 2024
“She’s looking to bring a quality and newness that isn’t the same old, same old”
Vincencia Adusei, President of VASE Construction and Jimmy Miller, President of Censere Consulting (and Former Executive Director and President of Elm City Communities/ Housing Authority of the City of New Haven and Glendower Group) stand in front of 94-96 Edwards St. , which Adusei renovated in 2021 into five apartments. (Aaron Flaum/Hartford Courant)
One of Hartford’s most visible gateways — between downtown and the city’s North End — is expected to see significant redevelopment in the next couple of years.
Apartment and storefront development around Dunkin’ Park will resume in the next few weeks. Nearby, residential rentals will blend historic buildings with new construction in a $19 million project at Albany Avenue and Main Street, likely to start this summer.
And beyond, an 1870s former tavern on Albany Avenue will anchor an $11 million project of apartments over storefronts, possibly beginning later this year.
Vincencia Adusei sees those developments as clear signs of a revival vibe and knows her estimated $5.5 million project on Edwards Street would fit right in.
“I love this site because it looks like there’s a lot of room to develop, not just here, but all around here,” Adusei said during a recent visit to Edwards Street, the historic tavern easily visible from her property. “So I really wanted to be a part of it.”
Adusei, the owner of a New Haven-based construction management firm, hopes to build a 4-story structure with 20 apartments where a historic building once stood but was destroyed by fire in 2020.
The development, which could begin in a year, is right next door to her first project in Hartford: the rehab of another historic structure — vacant and dilapidated for decades and dating to 1865 — completed in 2021.
A plaque in front of the historic 94-96 Edwards St. building in Hartford that Vincencia Adusei, President of VASE Construction/ VASE Development and her company turned into a five unit apartment. (Aaron Flaum/Hartford Courant)
Development is new territory for Adusei, whose firm, VASE Construction, has focused primarily on managing construction projects for other builders. Most have been in the New Haven and Fairfield counties, but among those in Hartford was the conversion of an old downtown hotel and later, rooming house, at 289 Asylum St., into apartments.
Adusei’s second, more ambitious project on Edwards Street still needs to pull together all the necessary financing. If she does, the apartment building will push both the boundaries of VASE and Adusei, a Black woman in an industry — real estate development — that is dominated by white men.
A 2023 report from Grove Impact, a social-impact consulting group, found that out of about 112,000 real estate development companies in the United States, about 111,000 are white owned. What’s more, of the 383 developers at the top of the industry that earn more than $50 million in annual revenue, just one is Latino and none is Black, according the Grove report.
Adusei, who is known by her nickname “Vee,” said she is attracted to development because it differs from being a general contractor. General contractors become involved when the plans for a project are all set and must be executed.
“Here, you’re starting from the ground up and saying, this is my vision for this,” Adusei said.
An empty lot next to 94-96 Edwards St. in Hartford where Vincencia Adusei, president of VASE Construction and her partner Jimmy Miller, a former city housing official in New Haven, hope to build a 20-unit apartment. (Aaron Flaum/Hartford Courant)
Adusei’s profile in the construction business has come to the attention of Gov. Ned Lamont. Lamont appointed Adusei to serve on the state’s Historic Preservation Council.
Adusei has partnered on the new project with Jimmy Miller, President of Censere Consulting (and former Executive Director and President of a New Haven housing Authority and the Glendower Group. Miller, who now runs a consulting business, has a decades long resume in housing across multiple states, including New York.
City officials in Hartford have long targeted the gateway area around Albany Avenue and Main Street as critical to reconnecting downtown and the North End, torn apart by interstate highway construction in the late 1960s.
Miller, a former city housing official in New Haven, said Hartford is showing the same “sense of vibe” that New Haven started experiencing two decades ago.
“You can see it here,” Miller said. “You can feel it here.”
‘All I ever really knew’
It isn’t so surprising that Adusei chose the business she’s in once she starts talking about her life.
A native of Ghana in West Africa, Adusei’s parents own a construction business that focuses not on buildings, but constructing roads. As a child, she remembers hopping into the back of a pick-up truck to tag along a trip to a job site.
“So growing up, that’s all I ever really knew,” Adusei said. “I was actually also fascinated about roads and how it all got developed, transportation and everything.”
She came to the United States when she was 14, living with family in New York. Adusei came to Connecticut to attend the University of Bridgeport where she earned undergraduate and graduate degrees, the latter a master’s in business administration.
A historic., but decaying 3-story building at 94-96 Edwards St. in Hartford prior to a rehabilitation into five apartments. A fire destroyed the neighboring building, at left, and it was demolished. Plans call for a 20-unit residential rentals on that property. (Courant File Photo)
While studying for her graduate degree, she entered an entrepreneurship program in the mid-2000s. The program helped launch her firm, first a “special events” business that grew into a general contracting firm by 2013 after she focused on business consulting. Her firm now employs 11.
The name VASE goes back to the early days when her firm was “Vincencia Adusei Special Events.” When she went to register her construction management business with the state, Adusei was asked the name of her company. She hadn’t really thought about it, so she took the initial letters of the special events business.
‘The real thing’
In 2018, Adusei came across Edwards Street in Hartford when she was headed to a school in the city that had a management project but mistakenly drove to the wrong one. She landed up at the Global Communications Academy and noticed the deteriorating, 3-story brick structure across the street at 94-96 Edwards St.
“I wondered, ‘What is going on over there?’ Adusei recalls thinking.
A previous developer had attempted a renovation but it turned troubled, amid a state ethics and conflict-of-interest probe. Adusei stepped in, with financing from private investors and the Hartford Community Loan Fund, a nonprofit that provides financing on community development projects, and completed the rehabilitation.
Rex Fowler, the loan fund’s chief executive, describes Adusei as a developer who takes a hands-on approach.
Vincencia Adusei, President of VASE Construction stands in an empty lot next to 94-96 Edwards St. in Hartford where she and a partner hope to build new apartments. (Aaron Flaum/Hartford Courant)
“She definitely has an extra motivation that we don’t always see in other developers, a hunger,” Fowler said. “She’s very engaged on her projects, and she stays on top of things.”
Adusei said the five apartments in 94-96 Edwards are lending stability to the street and haven’t had any turnover in leases. One of her tenants is a school principal in Hartford.
Financing for her next project on Edwards will be tougher because Adeusi and Miller are proposing new construction, so historic tax credits aren’t part of the equation.
In addition to the loan fund, Edwards is talking to the quasi-public Capital Region Development Authority, which helps fill funding gaps in housing projects in Hartford.
CRDA Executive Director Michael W. Freimuth, who has reviewed dozens of funding proposals for housing developments in the last decade, said Adusei is “the real thing.”
“She’s not only creative but she’s receptive to advice,” Freimuth said. “Our suggestions she takes with a high degree of earnestness, analyzes it and responds and it’s really refreshing to work with someone like her.”
Freimuth said, “What is most rewarding about someone like her — she’s pushing the market a little bit. She’s not building down to it. She’s looking to bring a quality and newness that isn’t the same old, same old.”
