After Stamford mayor’s plea, Board of Representatives approve money for outside legal fees
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STAMFORD — After Mayor Caroline Simmons accused the Board of Representatives of endangering the city’s legal efforts, the board reversed an earlier decision Monday and approved a transfer of money to the city’s law department.
They did so despite members’ concerns about the department spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on an investigation into the Board of Education.
The school board probe and related work, conducted last year by an outside law firm, cost more than $400,000. City representatives have said they were blindsided by the price tag, and some weren’t convinced that such an expensive undertaking was necessary, even though law department officials have argued that the probe potentially saved the city from having to pay millions of dollars in damages.
After months of debate, the Board of Representatives voted 26-10, with two abstentions, Monday night to appropriate $350,000 from the city’s contingency reserve to the law department, which now has racked up more than $200,000 in unpaid bills. The funding request failed to get enough support when it came up for a vote last month, but Simmons pressed the board to reconsider, saying the denial put certain legal efforts in jeopardy.
Officials have said that outside attorneys are currently working on behalf of the city on matters related to zoning, the schools mold crisis and union negotiations, among other issues.
Doug Dalena, the city’s director of legal affairs, said in a statement after the board’s vote that Simmons “is grateful for the votes of the members who recognized the need to protect our taxpayers in various ongoing and future legal matters.”
For the current fiscal year, which ends June 30, the law department had a $900,000 budget to pay for outside legal assistance.
The Board of Education probe stemmed from a complaint Superintendent Tamu Lucero filed last year on behalf of herself and senior staff alleging that some board members were, among other things, “creating an intimidating or bullying work environment.” Day Pitney, the law firm hired by the city to investigate the complaint, eventually produced a report backing many of the allegations.
Some members of the Board of Representatives, including District 15 Rep. Carmine Tomas, a Democrat, said the city effectively handed Day Pitney a blank check to investigate the claims.
“I don’t believe any one of us on this board or the taxpayers of this city would sign an open agreement not having an idea of how much something would cost,” said Tomas, who voted “no” during Monday’s meeting.
But other members, like Rep. Megan Cottrell, D-4, noted that the investigation occurred under Mayor David Martin’s administration and his director of legal affairs, Kathryn Emmett. Cottrell said she would vote in favor of approval “for the sake of a clean slate.”
Dalena has promised to try to provide “as much notice and as much information” as possible about unexpected expenses such as the school board probe to the Board of Representatives in the future.
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