Port Authority to Ask for Added State Pier Dollars, Lawmakers Seek to Rein in Contracting

Brendan Crowley

HARTFORD – As the Connecticut Port Authority prepares to ask the state for additional money to finish its $255.5 million (and counting) New London State Pier redevelopment, lawmakers are once again trying to rein in the quasi-public agency’s controversial methods for contracting work.

Despite public denials by authority officials, it’s been clear since at least October that construction setbacks in transforming the pier into a heavy-lift platform capable of handling offshore wind turbines would raise the cost of the project beyond the funding that was budgeted.

Connecticut Port Authority Chair David Kooris also admitted to Hearst Connecticut this month that the authority would likely ask the state for additional money, after promising lawmakers last May when they approved another $20 million in bond funds for the project that it would be the “final tranche” of funding they would ask for. 

About $353,000 of the $255.5 million of funding for the project remained in October, a number that the authority says remains the most current figure for the project.

Eversource and Ørsted have deflected in the past questions regarding their willingness to offset the rising costs beyond their initial $75 million investment in State Pier. When completed, the pier is expected to be a hub for their offshore wind partnership to ship out wind turbines for projects off the coasts of Rhode Island and Long Island starting this summer.

As the cost of the State Pier project – initially pegged at $93 million – continues to escalate, some state lawmakers are looking at the authority’s contracting processes that have drawn criticism since the project began. 

State Sen. Cathy Osten, D-Sprague, and State Rep. Christine Conley, D-Groton, have filed bills that would prohibit quasi-publics like the Port Authority from charging “success fees” to contractors, and bar construction managers on quasi-public projects from bidding for work on the project’s they’re overseeing.

According to a report from CT Mirror, Omaha-based Kiewit – one of the largest construction firms in the U.S. and the project manager for the State Pier redevelopment – used its position to push the authority to select it as the subcontractor for at least $87 million in work on the project. In some cases, according to the report, Kiewit convinced the authority to select its bids even when they were higher than competing offers. 

The final cost of the project is still unclear, and the Port Authority says the “final path forward” to complete the project will depend on ongoing negotiations between the Port Authority and the offshore wind partnership of Eversource and Ørsted, which the Port Authority board will discuss at a Feb. 21 meeting. 

But Osten said her main concern is the conflict of interest in having one company as the construction administrator oversee itself as a contractor. 

The proposed legislation would bring rules for quasi-public agencies in line with rules for state agencies, whose project managers cannot bid to perform work on the projects they’re overseeing.

“I’ve been told that they do this all the time in the private sector, but this is public sector dollars,” Osten said. “So, if this bill should get a public hearing, it would be to debate whether or not a contract administrator or manager should have the ability to bid on sub-components of a project of which they would be overseeing themselves.”

The proposed ban on “success fees” takes aim at a $523,000 payment the Port Authority paid Seabury Capital in 2018 as part of its contract to find a port operator for the State Pier.

The watchdog State Contracting Standards Board released a report last year questioning the legality of that fee – and also questioning whether the authority had the power to partner with private companies to redevelop the pier.

State law doesn’t allow agencies to pay “finders fees” to contractors, and the board said the fee paid to Seabury amounted to the same thing. The Port Authority argued that it was not subject to the state rules, and that it was common practice in the industry.

But Attorney General William Tong released a written opinion this week concluding that the authority did have the power to sign public-private partnerships when it made an agreement with port operator Gateway, Eversource and Ørsted to outfit the pier for wind turbines. Tong’s opinion said he was not taking a stance on whether any particular agreement was legal. His office has not yet said whether the success fee was allowed under state law.

“My understanding is the Attorney General is going to give a ruling, but as of this moment that hasn’t happened,” Osten said.

Gateway salt complaints discussed at Montville meeting

Kevin Arnold

Montville ― The Gateway salt saga continues.

At Tuesday night’s Planning and Zoning Commission meeting, residents addressed the commission about the disruption they say the facility is causing.

Crystal Daigle of Gair Court addressed the commission on behalf of her husband, Richard, who was at work, but had addressed the Town Council on Jan. 9.

Daigle reiterated their concerns about noise levels and trucks lining up on Depot Road. Because the trucks can block both exits to Gair Court, she said she is concerned about residents, as well as funeral processions, getting blocked by the trucks. Comstock Cemetery is next to Gair Court on Peter Avenue

She said her and other neighbors don’t feel safe walking around the neighborhood with dump trucks and tanker truckers parked on the sides of the road. She wondered why tanker trucks were necessary.

“He just wanted me to keep telling you guys about this until something is done because we had no vote on this or anything,” Daigle told commission members. “It just happened without anyone in the neighborhood knowing.”

Richard Daigle told Land Use and Planning Director Liz Burdick via email Tuesday that “I definitely want to be on record that I object to anything that is going on down there at the Thames River old Mill property because I believe the traffic studies are wrong.”

The Gateway facility is located at the former home of the AES Thames Cogeneration Facility, which shut down in 2011, and WestRock Papermill and Packaging plant, which closed in 2020.

F.A. Hesketh & Associates Inc. of East Granby conducted a traffic impact analysis prior to Gateway’s approval by the commission last July, and projected a typical increase of 10 trips per hour to and from the site during the summer and 25 per hour in the winter, with occasional pre-storm spikes of up to 65 trips per hour.

The report also said the facility would operate 14 hours a day, from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m and concluded that the roads in the area have the capacity to handle the increase in traffic.

Gateway attorney Harry Heller explained to the commission that not only was the site plan approved by the commission, but that it complies with all regulations and is in a industrial zone. He said it has been an industrial zone since the town adopted zoning in 1970.

Heller said that with 65% of the town’s industrial-zoned land has been eliminated and re-zoned since 1970, the Gateway land is a “critical component of economic development.”

He directly addressed the concerns raised by the Daigles, who Burdick said are the only ones to submit complaints to her department, though they say others in the neighborhood have complained. Crystal Daigle told the commission that other residents’ schedules don’t allow them to attend meetings.

Heller said that to reduce noise Gateway will install bumpers on the tailgates of its dump trucks and replace the backup alarms with OSHA approved ones that don’t make the typical beeping sound.

Heller added that the site can accommodate 30 trucks on the property and that trucks will not line up on Depot Road. As seen in the site plans, the facility has a one-way driveway to stage the trucks which are then loaded with salt and weighed before exiting the loop.

Though he could not say that the site will never do so, Heller said the facility is not designed to operate continuously at night.

“Obviously we want to welcome new businesses into our town, but it’s greatly affecting our neighbors,” Town Councilor Colleen Rix told the commission.

Rix, the council’s liaison with the commission, added, “We are all residents and we want our residents to feel comfortable.”

Burdick addressed the commission Tuesday and further explained in an email Wednesday that she and Mayor Ron McDaniel met with Gateway officials last Friday. She said they confirmed what Heller had said, and added that the salt pile would be covered this week, an issue raised by critic Kevin Blacker.

Gateway also said that the conveyor will eventually extend all the way to the salt pile, thus eliminating the need to transport salt by truck from the pier to the pile. The company added that equipment operators had been directed not to drop their buckets after loading the salt to the trucks as a way to reduce noise.

“Our department is taking this seriously,” Burdick said Tuesday. “The mayor is taking it seriously.”

She told the commission that going forward, the company told her that there will be no overnight operations, even in the event of a snow storm.

Burdick said in the email that she has been in constant communication with Gateway representative, James Dillman. She said Dillman told her on Wednesday that the terminal opened for business last week and had one truck per day until Tuesday, when nine trucks visited the facility.

Dillman also said that the salt pile was covered, a state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) requirement. Zoning Officer Meredith Badalucca conducts regular inspections of the site and, on Wednesday, reported that the pile was in the process of being covered.

Dillman explained that the tanker trucks Mrs. Daigle referenced were actually part of the construction process by Coit Excavation to remove storm water from the Gateway site and catch basins during the work.

Burdick also noted that there is an ongoing dam repair in the vicinity of the neighborhood at Gay Cemetery pond. The repairs are overseen by DEEP and not the town.

Blacker, who told the Town Council that these issues are a direct result of displacement of conventional cargo from State Pier in New London, shared similar sentiments with the commission on Tuesday.

“The noise is going to be a serious problem,” he told the commission.

Next phase of Meriden flood control includes demolition of vacant buildings

Michael Gagne

MERIDEN — The city’s ongoing effort to reduce flooding along Harbor Brook continues with the demolition of vacant structures on city-owned lands along Hanover and Butler streets. 

Late last spring, the city advertised a bid request for contractors to demolish the former Castle Bank at 100 Hanover St. and to demolish a former power house located on the city-owned property at 104 Butler St.

The Norwich-based firm Wiese Construction was awarded the contract to demolish both buildings. The total cost of the entire project is $699,900, said City Engineer Brian Ennis. 

Demolition of the former power house at 104 Butler St. began this week. 

Ennis said the building previously underwent remediation of hazardous materials and was partially demolished. The facility used to generate power for International Silver Company’s former Factory H plant.

“There was an old boiler, with asbestos insulation in the boiler, and two underground fuel storage tanks that needed to be pumped out and removed. All that work has been done,” Ennis said. 

Similar remediation of the former Castle Bank building also has been completed. Ennis explained the hazardous materials that were removed from that site included PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, caulk, and materials, which included flooring, that contained asbestos. 

After the demolition of both buildings is complete, both properties will become open space, Ennis explained. 

“There’s never going to be any development on there,” Ennis said. 

The city engineer explained that the next phase of the Harbor Brook flood control project will include extending the Linear Trail along Harbor Brook and the old Factory H site itself, at 116 Cook Ave.

“And that’s going to come through at the 100 Hanover parcel. So there’s going to be some landscaping… We’re going to pretty it up a little bit. It’s going to be like a small pocket park,” Ennis said. 

The grading of that side will be cut down to provide both storage and landscaping, Ennis said. 

Officials are not planning to build trails or to make other improvements at the 104 Butler St. site, other than feeding it with what Ennis called a “wildlife mix.” The property will be maintained by city crews annually. 

Ennis said the purpose of the demolitions is to remove the buildings. 

“We’re going to drastically alter the floodplain when we get into the next phase of the project,” he said. 

The city awaits additional funding — $15 million — to complete an extensive flood control project that runs from Cooper Street to South Colony Street. That project, Ennis said, is in “semi-final design.”

Officials plan to send that project out to bid next winter. Ennis said it would be completed over the course of two separate construction seasons. It will consist of two bridge replacements, along with widening of the Harbor Brook channel in that area. 

“If we get all of our funding in place, we will be replacing the bridges during the construction season of 2024, and then doing the channel improvements in the next construction season in 2025,” Ennis said. 

Contamination complicates Bridgeport's sale of Sikorsky Airport

Brian Lockhart

BRIDGEPORT — It could cost millions of dollars to clean up tainted dirt at Sikorsky Memorial Airport, and responsibility for that hefty bill has to be determined before the city can move ahead with the pending sale of the facility.

"There's no doubt we continue to have an interest in seeing that airport developed, but this is a formidable issue that we have to get behind us," Kevin Dillon, director of the Connecticut Airport Authority, said Thursday. “It comes down to there’s a big number that needs to be dealt with and we're looking at different paths to deal with it.”

The CAA for at least a year has been negotiating with Mayor Joe Ganim's administration to purchase the Bridgeport-owned, Stratford-based aviation facility for $10 million. According to Dillon, the environmental assessment his organization commissioned as part of those talks was recently completed and estimated the potential ground remediation to be in the $4 million to $16 million range.

The state property transfer law which would apply to Sikorsky's sale to the CAA requires "the disclosure of environmental conditions when certain properties and/or businesses are transferred (and) that a party signing the property transfer form certification agrees to investigate the parcel and remediate pollution caused by any release of a hazardous waste or hazardous substance from the establishment."

Dillon noted there would have to be further phases of study to determine a more specific price tag, which would cost a few hundred thousand additional dollars, shifting the total price tag range further upward to the $6 million to $19 million range.

"We knew we were going to have to deal with this environmental piece at some point," Dillon said, noting that was one of the requirements stated in a "term sheet" the authority's board approved last February outlining the requirements of a purchase.

That document specified, “The existence of contamination and required remediation may affect the date of sale and, possibly, the city’s ability to sell the airport.” 

"The thing that's probably new ... is the size of the potential liability," Dillon said. "When you start talking about a $10 million acquisition price and a cleanup of $4 million to $16 million, you have to really take a step back and say, 'Where are we going with this from a financial standpoint?'"

But Dillon and Daniel Roach, a Ganim aide, said the analysis' results are not a deal breaker and there are ways to move forward.

"It has not been determined if there’s other responsible parties (for the tainted dirt), so those numbers could be mitigated by others having to contribute to the cleanup costs," Dillon said. 

He also noted that when state lawmakers created the CAA over a decade ago to take over operating Connecticut-owned airports from the state Department of Transportation, the terms specified that should any future development at those sites require environmental remediation, the state would be on the hook to pay for it.

That could at least delay a pricey cleanup at Sikorsky, but not put it off indefinitely given the Ganim administration's and the CAA's desire to expand services there to make the site more economically viable.

"As you develop that property and start to disturb soils ... you're going to have to deal with whatever contamination would be on those sites potentially before you could move forward with the construction," Dillon said. 

Roach said the sections of the land most likely to be developed in the future are areas believed to have "the least amount of problems."

And, he added, the cleanup criteria could differ depending on usage.

"It's been functioning like every other airport with environmental issues," Roach said. "It's not like we're looking to put a day care center there."

Asked how the environmental contamination at Sikorsky compares to that at Bradley International in Windsor Locks and the five other Connecticut airports in the CAA's portfolio, Dillon said, “On an individual basis, I think the issue at Sikorsky is certainly more significant.”

Dillon also acknowledged that negotiations could shift from the CAA acquiring Sikorsky to instead leasing and managing it. That landlord/tenant relationship had also been floated when the CAA and Gov. Ned Lamont in November 2021 first announced efforts to have the authority assume management of Sikorsky from Bridgeport.

“That’s a potential," Dillon said. "A lease document becomes far more complex than a sale document, and that was one of the reasons why we started to go down the road of actually purchasing the airport. ... But that’s always a possibility.” 

Proponents of the sale of the airport to the CAA have argued it is the best way to upgrade the facility, revive the long-dormant commercial passenger operation there —  the complex currently caters to business, charter and private flights — and pursue other changes to make Sikorsky a more successful operation.

The $10 million asking price is based on the estimated funds Bridgeport has sunk into the airport over the last several years. Because so much federal money has been invested there, it is not treated as a typical real estate deal and the city cannot sell it at a profit. 

But the Ganim administration had counted on the purchase being finalized by the end of 2022 when last spring the mayor and City Council approved the current 2022-23 municipal budget, balanced with $4 million of that $10 million.

Bridgeport City Council President Aidee Nieves said Thursday she has been worried about what the results of the CAA's environmental review might be.

Nieves is also a member of the city's airport commission, which last May voted to move forward with a deal with the CAA and reject an offer from Stratford Mayor Laura Hoydick for her town to buy Sikorsky instead.

Hoydick represents Stratford on the commission and was the only member to vote "no." A final deal would still need to come to Bridgeport's City Council.

In the near term, Nieves said, the Ganim administration will need to figure out how to plug the $4 million budget hole before the current fiscal year ends June 30.

"I never really felt we'd get the deal done in less than two years," Nieves said.

As for what to do about the tainted ground at the airport, Nieves, who initially had opposed a sale, said, "I don't want to be responsible for a $16 million cleanup" but also recognizes the city cannot simply unload that problem onto another entity.

"I don't want to be stuck with the bill, nor do I want to be a 'junk car' salesman," Nieves said about whether to sell or lease Sikorsky. "What is the lesser of two evils? ... What is the least financial impact on our taxpayers?"

Hoydick on Thursday said given the tens of millions it is taking to remediate the Raymark site in town and the age of the airport, which Bridgeport purchased in 1937, the potential cost of cleaning up Sikorsky is not surprising. Raymark is a former auto parts manufacturing plant listed as a federal superfund site.

"It's old infrastructure and things need to be improved," Hoydick said of the airport. "'But I think the reward is great. Obviously the CAA thinks so, too. So we'll see what happens."

New Haven planners delay Tweed New Haven airport parking vote amid storm runoff concern

Mark Zaretsky

NEW HAVEN — Nearly five hours of public testimony on Tweed New Haven Regional Airport's application to add 34 parking spaces in the more distant of its two front parking lots yielded no immediate decision, but City Plan Commission members were moved enough by neighbors' concerns about runoff to want to study it further.

The commission opted late Wednesday to leave the public hearing open and resume at a special meeting Feb. 25. 

The proposed additional spaces were removed from a previous application for 203 spaces approved in October because the 34 spaces involved moving a fence within a regulated inland wetlands and coastal management area. Parking has been an issue at Tweed as Avelo Airlines continues to grow. During holiday peak periods, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, existing parking came close to filling up some days.

A petition to add Tweed neighbor and expansion opponent Gabriela Campos Matteson, who wanted to bring in her own environmental scientist, as an intervenor in the application failed by a 2-2 vote. Chairwoman Leslie Radcliffe and member Joy Gary voted in favor. Joshua Van Hoesen and alternate Carl Goldfield voted against it.

Three votes were needed for it to pass.

But after hearing several of the more than 15 members of the public who addressed the commission express concerns about potential runoff — from a project that a lawyer for airport operator Avports said amounted to "moving a fence" within an already-paved area  — Radcliffe wanted to know more.

She initially raised the possibility of the commission hiring its own environmental consultant. Van Hoesen suggested asking the city's Environmental Advisory Council to do research and weigh in.

But after Avports representative Andrew King asked whether installing a runoff treatment system might "be an appropriate measure" and City Plan Department Executive Director Laura Brown offered to act as a liaison, members agreed to let them discuss ways to address concerns between now and the next meeting.

"I'm not comfortable with closing the public hearing at this point. There's just a lot out there that I want to know," said Radcliffe.

Radcliffe pointed out that if contaminants "are going back into the waterways," as some suggested, "I don't think a fence is going to stop that."

Joe Williams, attorney for Avports, said "the only regulated activity that we've applied for is moving the fence within the paved area," and a sedimentation and erosion control plan is part of the application.

The application was complicated by two cease-and-desist orders city Building Official Jim Turcio issued in November and December after a contractor installed a fence that had not yet been approved.

"We were in the middle of a transition between adding new management personnel" and a contract "started the work and it was noticed," King said. "... They notified the city and the work stopped."

Williams said the parking is intended to be temporary and would be in use until a proposed new terminal and new parking lots can be built on the East Haven side of the airport.

King said that even if the current application isn't approved, the area covered by the current application "will be used for 'airport ops' ... Whatever the airport needs at the time, whether it's parking or staging or overnight parking for planes."

Goldfield told his colleagues, "If we don't approve this, they're going to use that for materials storage. ... They're going to continue to use it the way that they're using it, because they have every right to."

Ray Paier, an environmental engineer with Westcott & Mapes, said an existing fence that was installed without approval "is going to be removed. That's part of this application." The proposed new fence would be driven into the pavement about 50 yards west of the current fence, he said.

During public testimony, resident Margaret Wheeler said, "We're not here just to complain. We're here to bring facts," and "the main idea here is to protect the wetlands." She said Tweed's parking lots "are within 50 feet of the wetlands area."

East Haven shorefront resident Lianne Audette said that when there's runoff from the parking lot, "all sorts of things will be in that water, and water will move. This bothers me a lot, because there's a lot of crap in that water and it will move into the wetlands."

Laura Cahn of Cleveland Road, who chairs the Environmental Advisory Council , said that "even an inch of soil moved disrupts the wetlands" and this application would move considerably more than that. "I would like to hear a soil scientist" discuss the effects, she said.

After Danbury’s career academy encounters new complications, city zoners bend the dimension rules

Rob Ryser

DANBURY — The city’s plans to retrofit a corporate campus into a career academy for 1,400 upper grade students ran into new complications as soon as the city received permission to rezone the 24-acre site from industrial to residential, and thereby permit the school.

“We did just go in and revise the zone to a residential zone which unfortunately drove us to have to get (a) variance (for) the building height from 52 feet to 55 feet,” said Antonio Iadarola, the city engineer, during a public hearing earlier this month. “The other thing is in the (residential) zone we are really only allowed to have a three-story, but the existing building is a four-story, so unfortunately due to the change in the zoning, it does require us to have you endorse the existing condition of the four-story building that is currently out there right now.”

And that wasn’t all.

“The (side yard) setback for a (residential) zone is 50 feet but unfortunately we only have 38 feet,” Iadarola said. “This is an existing condition.”

Iadarola further had to dispel concern that the city was adding two stories atop the existing building in a residential zone.

“I had several calls where people thought we were raising the height of the building 20 feet,” Iadarola said. “That is not the case at all.”

People may have gotten that idea because the city’s variance application said it proposed to increase the height of the building from 35 feet to 55 feet.

The good news is the Zoning Board of Appeals was more than willing to bend the rules to accommodate the city’s most important infrastructure project. The bad news is the Zoning Board of Appeals didn’t follow its own rules when it approved the variances on Jan. 12.

As a result, zoners had to call a special meeting a week later to revote and correct the technical error.

ZBA Vice Chairman Juan Rivas called it “a technical error that transpired at the meeting of Jan. 12 where two alternates who voted favorably on the variance request were not seated by the chair to vote as regular members.”

If it sounds like the city is pressed for time, it is.

Leaders acknowledged earlier this week that the city will miss the career academy’s target opening date of August 2024, and the $164 million project will not be ready until the start of the next school year in August 2025.

That means city schools will have to suffer another year of overcrowding in a district that was counting on a new high school and a new middle school to start the 2024-2025 academic year.

The reason: failed negotiations with The Summit in February 2022 to locate the career academy at the 1.2-million-square-foot complex sent the city scrambling for an alternative with no room for error. Although the city promptly found a “better fit” at the former Cartus Corp. site on Apple Ridge Road, it took four months for the seller to remove a non-development deed restriction on 12 acres of the property, which the city insisted on before buying it.

That was four months the city didn’t have.

“Although we anticipate being able to finish the project well before August of 2025, you can’t open up a school of this size in mid-year,” Iadarola told The News-Times this week.

Schools Superintendent Kevin Walston said the district planned to implement the career academy model in 2024-25, but without the new west side facility.

Meanwhile the city continues its plans to retrofit the 260,000-square-foot office building overlooking Danbury Fair mall into a high school and middle school.

On Wednesday, Danbury’s Environmental Impact Commission gave the city the green light to build near environmentally sensitive land.

In addition to the two schools, blueprints call for new district offices and the add-on construction of a gymnasium.

“This project will not have any immediate or direct impact on the wetlands,” Iadarola told the environmental commission. “All the work on this project is in the 100 foot (buffer) and consists of removing pavement and putting down new pavement, converting existing pavement into grass area and restoring the storm water basins to their original configuration.”

CT Port Authority rightfully formed partnership for State Pier, Tong says

 Brian Scott-Smith

State Attorney General William Tong said the Connecticut Port Authority was within its rights when it hired a harbor management company to operate the State Pier in New London as a hub for the offshore wind industry.

The legal opinion came Tuesday at the request of the State Contracting Standards Board to look into whether the port authority was allowed to enter into a public-private partnership.

Tong said the port authority was allowed to make these agreements with Gateway, Eversource and Ørsted in 2020.

The law changed the following year when a legislative amendment curbed any quasi-public agency from establishing any new public-private partnerships. That power is now limited to the state Department of Transportation.

Andrew Lavigne, the manager of business development and special projects, said, “The attorney general’s opinion is welcomed confirmation” of the port authority’s statutory authority.

Acting State Standards Board Chair Robert Rinker said they are reviewing the legal opinion, but he raised concerns about how the state should interpret public-private partnerships where quasi-publics are involved.

“The Connecticut General Assembly may wish to address this during their current legislative session,” he said.

The state attorney general’s office is still investigating the $500,000 success fee the port authority paid to its consultant Seabury Capital for finding the State Pier project a contractor.

This story was first published Jan. 25, 2023 by WSHU.

Wallingford approves $34M for police station

Kate Ramunni

WALLINGFORD — The Town Council this week approved bonding more than $34 million to turn the former 3M office building into the town’s new police station, though several council members again expressed concerns about the issue of meeting minutes indicating the recommendation to make an environmental report “disappear.”

The council voted 8-1 to approve amending the ordinance previously approved that bonded $3.3 million for the purchase of 100 Barnes Road to add $31,548,000 for the renovations to building, bringing the total to $34,848,000.

But hanging over the vote was the issue of the Police Station Steering Committee minutes of its Oct. 13, 2022 meeting, where architect Brian Humes made a comment that he would recommend a report that mentioned the issue of PCBs “disappear.” Republican Councilor Craig Fishbein brought up the minutes of that meeting at the council’s Jan 10 meeting.

Fishbein said that night that he found the comment troubling, and on Tuesday said one reason he did was because of the situation in Fairfield where four town officials are facing charges regarding the illegal disposal of PCBs. When he read the steering committee meeting minutes, that raised a red flag for him, he said.

“If the report wasn’t that bad, why make it disappear? Why did no one at meeting question that statement? Is that statement of practice so common that OK, it’s just another one we’re going to make disappear?” he asked. “That’s the takeaway from the recording, and because there was no rebuke one could assume that that overture was acceptable and that the action was undertaken, and that’s troubling. I totally agree we need a new police station, but I’m just really concerned about whether I can vote on this with the veil of what is going on.”

“I would assume Mr. Humes would agree that he expressed his opinion, on the matter of testing for PCBs, in an unsuitable way and that he unintentionally misspoke,” Democratic Councilor Sam Carmody said. “What I have an issue with is that Mayor Dickinson intentionally held a press conference to deny that such statements, referenced in the meeting minutes were ever said, and a draft report mentioning PCBs ever even existed. The mayor’s press conference not only emphasized wrong information, but it also left a bad taste in the mouths of many because of its inaccuracy and because of its poor tone. I think this whole debacle has been stirred up mainly because of the erroneous information that was shared by our mayor at his press conference last week.”

Carmody said that while he often disagrees with the mayor’s policy positions, he feels he “can always be trusted, that your words are always truthful and that your intentions and devotion to our town are noble.

“While I think your intentions and devotion to our town remains unchanged, I am disappointed, and I have to question the trustworthiness of this administration after witnessing last week’s press conference. You got it all wrong,” Carmody said.

Councilior Joseph Marrone also said the press conference was a misstep on the mayor’s part.

“At the press conference the comment was made that someone was trying to impugn the integrity of the committee. The act of impugning the integrity of the committee was reading the committee’s minutes, and that was the item that was so offensive it required a press conference,” he said. “I am rather embarrassed that we had to have a press conference and the facts were misstated. I don’t understand how at this level of government these kinds of things happen. I think the reason these things are happening is because we are in a crisis. We have kicked the can so many times down the road that now we need a police station or bust. The building is on fire and we’re in an emergency now.”

Councilor Christina Tatta, who was the only member to vote against the bonding, said she too was disturbed by the press conference, especially the light it cast on the steering committee’s recording secretary, Cheryl-Ann Tubby.

“Several times in the meeting it was said that the integrity of the steering committee was impugned because of the questioning of the minutes. It was also said the minutes were inaccurate. However, after comparing the audio and the minutes, the minutes were a direct quote, and I feel Ms. Cheryl Ann Tubby, the recording secretary, deserves an apology for her competency being impugned by those statements,” Tatta said. “I’ve known Ms. Tubby to be outstanding at her job, and seeing her name on the minutes, I was sure that they were accurate because she always does a very good job. So to see her job be publicly brought into question, and wrongfully so as it turns out, that affects her career.”

Tatta asked that a public apology be made to Tubby and be included in her personnel file so it is not an issue for her going forward. But Dickinson said he has not read the minutes and did not say they were wrong.

“I indicated that the minutes are a summary — they always have been. I don’t believe I ever said they were incorrect,” he said. But to rely solely on the minutes as proof of guilt over the suggestion of making a report disappear is wrong, he said.

“To take minutes and from that deduce that people are intentionally committing an unlawful act I find highly irresponsible,” he said. “If you’re going to accuse people of a very serious act of hiding or destroying public records, then you need to look at more than minutes in your collection of evidence. That, to me, is impugning the character and intentions of people who are serving the community.

“I haven’t read the minutes. I didn’t characterize the minutes as incorrect or correct,” he said. “My concern is that if there is a belief or deduction of that kind, more evidence has to be collected than to read minutes of a meeting.”

New building needed

Ultimately everyone on the council agreed the town needs a new police station. Plans for one have been in the works for years, with acknowledgments that the department has outgrown its current home at 135 North Main St., which got serious in 2021 when the town bought the Barnes Road property.

In 2007, former police chief Douglas Dortenzio submitted a report to the council on why the town needed a new police station, current Chief John Ventura told the council. Those plans were then estimated to cost $22 million, “but because of the economic downturn that happened, that was a nonstarter,” Ventura said, referring to the recession of 2008-09.

In the intervening years, “the problems at 135 North Main St. did not stop,” Ventura said. The town bought that building, the former Armory, in 1983 and renovated it into a new police department that officers moved into three years later.

But by 1992, only six years later, it was clear that the department had already outgrown that building, Ventura said. The design of that building is poor, he said, with “cavernous” hallways leading to small cramped offices.

Multiple chiefs, same plea

Dortenzio came to the council in 2009 to plead for its support for a new station, and in 2020 former chief William Wright did the same.

“There is no thermostats in the building — it’s either hot/very hot or cold/very cold. You can’t set the temperature in the building,” Ventura said. Last August, when they tried to fire up the boilers, they wouldn’t turn on so they had to have a company come in, he said. “They did get them started, but it’s a constant struggle to keep them running.”

The air conditioning system, too, is very old and when in use the department must have the company come in at least once a month to keep it running, Ventura said. “It’s not an easy system and my training officer has been converted to almost building maintenance unfortunately because he’s on top of all the contractors that need to come in,” he said.

Other features in the old building are downright dangerous, Ventura said, calling the cell block system “archaic.” The security system monitoring the cells is located outside of the cells, rather than in them as is the case with modern stations, so being able to see what is going on in the cells is difficult, he said.

“That cell block is a lawsuit waiting to happen,” Ventura said. “I personally had to run down there and cut someone down from the bars who was trying to injure themselves. It’s a huge liability.”

It also can turn into a crisis when a prisoner decides to flood a cell block, Ventura said. “What we need to do — and I’m not exaggerating when I say this — is we need to find the smallest officer that’s working and put them through a door to manually crawl into the space behind the cell blocks to turn the water off.”

Modern systems have controls in the cell or outside of it so it is much easier to contain such a situation, he said.

There’s no temporary holding area to isolate a prisoner being booked so have to have another officer there for safety when booking someone, Ventura said. And space for officers is also limited, especially in the locker area.

“We have locker space for one female officer,” Ventura said. “I have six female officers and if we fill vacancies with female officers, I don’t have room for them.”

Such is also the case in the men’s locker room, he said. The male locker rooms are at capacity and are not large enough to accommodate equipment such as bullet proof vests and helmets, so those are often stored outside the lockers. There are no electrical outlets in the locker room so officers have to charge equipment at home or find a place in the building, he said. There are two showers that offer no privacy whatsoever, he said, and when a prospective employee sees these conditions, they are often turned off.

“For a female officer to walk in and see that, it’s not appealing,” he said, “and there’s a lot of other departments that they can go to with newer buildings and equipment.”