The City Council Meeting

I gave up on the City Council meeting at about 10:30 after sitting through 3.5 hours, and after the council broke to caucus, but before they voted on the West Haven Taxpayer initiative. As best I can tell, though, it was entirely a mute point by then.

The biggest impressions that hit me as I walked away from the meeting was one of disbelief that so much unchallenged mis-information could be presented in one meeting, and disappointment that so few residents attended. In our town of more than 50,000 people, there were only about 75 taxpayers in attendance.

For those who haven't been to a City Council meeting, besides urging you to attend at least one per year, let me explain how I understand the meeting to work (my experience with these meetings are not great - this is my first meeting). After the meeting is called to order, there is a Public Comment section. Anyone in the city of West Haven can sign up to speak; you must present your first and last names, and your address, and you can only speak once. There is no limit on how long you can speak, although one is urged to be brief. No one can interrupt your speech, and no one answers any questions you may pose. Others are welcome to come and respond later in the Public Comment time - but remember, they can only speak once.

Basically, anyone can say anything about anything on their mind... and say anything they did. 25 people spoke - from 7pm through 9:30pm. And sadly, because there was no official response section to each of the public comments, it's very hard to separate the truth from the fiction, even when some points were refuted by others later in the proceedings. Who's to say who was the correct responder?

Upon arriving, I received a hand-out, of which according to Mrs. Tara Picard (yes, the mayor's wife was one of the public commenters about half way through the session) had been suppied by former Mayor Borer's sister in law. There were definitely some half truths, half facts, and possibly some out and out mistruths on that hand out. Mrs. Picard urged the council to consider initiating a police investigation into political misdoings with the handouts, in that were political statements being distributed without proper identification of whose agenda it was (or something to that effect.)

Mrs. Picard also discussed the fact that her father's name was on their deed, stating that it really was none of anyone's business, but that her father's name was on the deed as their 'building advisors'. She also stated that she and Mayor Picard pay taxes on the property, and the leasing company pays the taxes on their cars. Truly, she has a point - the taxes are paid for the place where they live. However, I think people feel like she and Mayor Picard haven't financially invested themselves into this city, and find that uncomfortable, particularly as Mayor Picard's occupation is that of a financial advisor.

I'm not going to bore everyone by going through play by play - but there are a number of good points raised, and a few good highlights, which I'll go into tomorrow in more detail. There were also a bunch of political revelations to me, that explain a whole bunch of things, including why the West Haven Voice is pro-Mayor Picard, and anti-Mayor Borer - but I'll wait for tomorrow for that, too.

After the public session, the city council said the Pledge of Allegence to the Flag, paid some bills.

Then came a fascinating segment where the Bond lawyer that was retained back on Dec 29, 2005 came to speak on his findings for the School Construction Report. This investigation looked into the bonding pracices on 8 recent school construction projects.

He explained that West Haven's bonding ordinances were ordinary; that there were borrowing limits (total amount that could be bonded) and expenditure limits (total project costs), and that basically, the borrowing limit was found by subtracting the value of any state grants from the expenditure limits imposed by the vote of the city council. That's pretty straight forward.

However, it soon became clear that the school projects did NOT follow the ordinances properly.

In four of the projects, borrowing limits were exceeded by $4.4 million. In these projects, where the city council had authorized a certain amount of total expenditures for the project, 100% of the total expenditure had been bonded. Additionally, though, the city had received grant monies from the state, which were placed into the general fund and used for operating expenses.

It becomes more complex, though, as many of these projects also showed a negative balance. This occurs when money is advanced from the general fund which is earmarked for other uses. While this is an acceptable practice, the money has to be paid back into the fund. From those same 4 projects, the general fund is owed $9.8 million.

What the city has appeared to have done for some time, even prior to Mayor Borer's time in office, was to take those negative balances and bond out that amount. Groan.

So, as mentioned there were 8 projects.

1 was not bonded, and was not an issue.

For one project there is a negative balance to the general fund of abut $970,000. Had this amount been bonded, then there would have been about $575,000 in excess of the allowable bond by ordinance.

For another project, thankfully this one can be restored, and will not be overborrowed.

The final project did not have enough information to make a final determination.

The Bond lawyer, who I believe was named Mr. Thassy (my apologies for any mistakes - I'm worked by ear), then stated:

The pattern of non-school project bonding, however, is different from that of the school project bonding. For the school projects, while they were overbonded (i.e. we borrowed too much), we did not appear to overspend. Instead, the grants alloted to the school projects were diverted to the general fund, and then bonded as well.

For non-school projects, it would appear that we overbonded AND overspent. The lawyer then stated that he wanted the details and authorizations for all projects AT LEAST back to 1996... ugh.

... at any rate... more tomorrow.