Gould chides ethics chairman: Claims Burnham has conflict of interest

By Claire Bessette
Published on 2/13/2008

Norwich — Alderman Robert Zarnetske continued to question the city's new community development small business grant program this week, asking whether technical assistance offered to one applicant and preliminary screening by city staff was proper and fair and why grant decisions were made behind closed doors.

City officials involved in the program responded that federal guidelines require technical assistance and that the program couldn't function without confidentiality. Zarnetske, who served as city manager when the program was proposed nearly a year ago, also continued to assert that the review committee of technical advisers should meet in public. Zarnetske presented a three-page letter to City Manager Alan Bergren Monday addressed to the City Council Administration, Planning and Economic Development Committee.

Zarnetske resigned as city manager June 6, 2007, after a tumultuous 17 months in office that included frequent conflicts with Mayor Benjamin Lathrop and the former City Council. Bergren said Tuesday that he would review the letters from Zarnetske and respond to the concerns.

In his Feb. 11 letter to Bergren — the second in less than a week on the new community development micro-enterprise grant program — Zarnetske said the handling of the first round of grant approvals was “not acceptable and must be remedied.”

But Thomas Marien, an accountant and volunteer on the grant-review panel and also an adviser to the economic development committee, disputed Zarnetske's position that the review committee is a public entity. He said the committee could not function if sessions had to be open, because members review confidential financial records, income tax forms, business plans and strategies. He likened it to similar review panels that have handled small business loan programs in the past.

“I don't think you could have a very worthwhile program if you did it in public,” Marien said.

Marien also disputed Zarnetske's position that the grant applicants should not receive any technical advice or assistance from city staff. He said the staff should be providing that assistance. The issue came to the forefront after a letter of complaint by applicant John Andriote, whose application was denied by the committee. Andriote complained he never got the chance to speak to committee members, but only met with Assistant City Manager Jennifer Gottlieb and community development staff member Susan Goldman.

During those discussions, the staff told Andriote that his initial plan for a coffee vending truck would not qualify for assistance. They advised him to rewrite his business plan to open a downtown coffee shop instead. Andriote followed that advice and proposed Downtown Joe Coffeehouse & Lounge.

“I'm not sure I want a government entity doing that,” Zarnetske said of the advice given to Andriote. “I suggested to the city manager that we should not be giving advice, solicited or unsolicited, to any applicants.

Gottlieb, who sent a written response Tuesday to Zarnetske's first letter on the issue, said that guidelines in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development — which oversees federal community development block grant money — specifically call for staff to offer technical assistance “to enable such entities to facilitate economic development.”

The section describing the aid states: “providing technical assistance, advice and business support services (including assistance, advice and support relating to development business plans, securing funding, conducting marketing and otherwise engaging in microenterprise activities) to owners of microenterprises and persons developing microenterprises....”

Gottlieb added that the grant program review was modeled after a similar small-business loan program in California, which has a technical review committee that acts on the proposals. She also said other Norwich block-grant assistance programs are run through technical reviews that don't involve public meetings.

For example, the city pays tuition supplements to qualifying nursing students at Three Rivers Community College. Staff at Three Rivers and the city's Human Services Department choose the students based on financial need, and the community development office accepts those decisions.

In his letter and during the Administration, Planning and Economic Development Committee meeting, Zarnetske argued that the microenterprise grant committee should be formed as a public committee that holds open meetings and then votes to go into executive session to discuss specific grant applications and then opens the meeting again for votes on the proposals.

Silvester Testifies Against Ex-Senate Majority Leader; Rowland's former treasurer asserts at SEC trial an illicit payment made to his friend
DAY
By Associated Press
Published on 5/13/2007

New Haven (AP) — Former state Treasurer Paul Silvester testified Friday that he arranged for an equity company to pay a large finder's fee to his longtime friend, former state Senate Majority Leader Bill DiBella.

The $374,500 commission was built into a $75 million dollar state pension fund investment that Silvester signed with Thayer Capital Partners in 1998. It was done to reward DiBella for his work on another, unrelated deal, Silvester testified.

Silvester, a Republican who served two years in federal prison for accepting bribes in exchange for investing pension funds, was a government witness in its civil case against DiBella, a leading Democrat. The Securities and Exchange Commission is seeking to have DiBella forfeit the $374,500 commission. He does not face any criminal charges.

Silvester, who has known DiBella since childhood, said he wanted his friend to be paid after another firm, Paine Webber, failed to give DiBella any money for arranging a meeting that led to a separate pension fund investment.

“He went to a lot of trouble introducing the state to a great group of people and he didn't get compensated for it,” Silvester testified.

Silvester said that after he decided invest $75 million in a private equity fund run by Republican financier Frederic Malek, he asked Malek to hire DiBella as a consultant and pay him the $374,500 commission.

Earlier in the trial, Malek testified that he could not recall DiBella doing anything to earn the money. Silvester denied that DiBella played a role in other questionable pension deals.

“Mr. DiBella had no knowledge of any of this,” Silvester testified. “Mr. DiBella would never participate in such a scheme.”

The SEC alleges that politics was behind Silvester's decision to create a sham commission for DiBella.

Silvester has testified on other occasions that DiBella implicitly supported his campaign for treasurer by not supporting Democrat Denise Nappier, who unseated Silvester in 1998. Evidence has been presented by the SEC showing that Silvester arranged the DiBella commission after losing the election for treasurer.

Hot Topics in Wilton: A Matter of Ethics
By Jeff Yates
Nov 16, 2006

Wilton certainly isn’t the first community to take a hard look at its Code of Ethics, and it certainly won’t be the one to solve the age-old question of what makes “right” right, but the town is interested in doing what it can to solve its own ethics dilemma.

During a discussion on Tuesday at the Wilton Library called “A Matter of Ethics,” one of the many “Hot Topics” meetings sponsored by the library and the Wilton League of Women Voters, a panel of experts, both local and state, attempted to encapsulate the debate around ethics codes and what can be done to improve them. The panel included First Selectman William Brennan, Council on Ethics chair Paul Burnham, Wilton Historical Society co-president Owen Williams, Andy Sauer, executive director of Connecticut Common Cause, a nonprofit government ethics watchdog group, and Enid Oresman, a member of the state’s Citizens Ethics Advisory Board. More than 40 residents were in attendance.

At the center of the discussion was the town’s Code of Ethics, described as being “full of holes” and in need of rewriting to correct vague statements and, in some sections, complete omissions. How the town gets to a better code, and what that would look like, however, was a matter of some debate among the panelists.

The issue of ethics is a debate that stretches back thousands of years, to the time of the Greek philosophers in the 5th Century, who first battled with the notion of right and wrong.

Mr. Williams, a doctoral student in history at Yale University, started the night off with a brief history of the philosophic study of ethics. He pointed to the Greeks as the first true philosophers who considered the question of right and wrong, and outlined the progressive steps, setbacks and changes that have been made to our understanding of ethics over the years. (See related article.)

Ms. Oresman spoke next, explaining how the state has evolved in its consideration of ethics.

A member of the nine-member Citizens Ethics Advisory Board, appointed by Gov. M. Jodi Rell, Ms. Oresman said the state is tackling the issue of ethics and looking to broaden the impact to all reaches of government.

A newly created Office of State Ethics has been created, acting as an independent state agency, and each state agency now has an “ethics compliance officer” to oversee its activities, she said.

Among the tasks before it, the state ethics agency is responsible for educating the public and state officials, overseeing the behavior of officials and lobbyists, interpreting and applying the state ethics code, and investigating ethics complaints.

Although focused primarily on state-level issues, “we ... receive complaints about municipal ethics codes weekly,” Ms. Oresman said. One major goal in 2007 is to consider and resolve the issue of municipal codes, something that was brought up two years ago.

Mr. Sauer said it’s important for residents to understand that a code of ethics works only when it’s enforced, and if people are willing to stand up and call their elected officials to task for apparently unethical behavior.

Only 59% of towns in Connecticut actually have a written code of ethics, he said, and some towns that have what his group considers the best codes do not enforce them, making them virtually worthless. In a recent survey of all codes in every town, Mr. Sauer’s group ranked Wilton’s Code of Ethics at a three out of 10. He said some of the best codes are those that are most simple, pointing to the code at West Point among the cadets.

“A cadet will not lie, cheat, or steal, nor tolerate any who does,” said Mr. Sauer, paraphrasing the code. “Period.”

The major mistake most residents make, said Mr. Sauer, is that “we presume that government will be responsible, we presume that someone will be watching out.”

Wilton’s code

Mr. Burnham, who spoke on what he saw as gaps in Wilton’s code, said he disagreed with Mr. Sauer’s assessment of Wilton’s Code of Ethics.

“I’m somewhat surprised, frankly, that we did that well,” he said.

Mr. Burnham briefly described the town’s code, and explained how it compares to those of other area towns. Most towns, he said, have a five- member council on ethics, while others have even more members. Wilton’s council is made up of three appointed members, though two of the seats will be vacated at the end of the month.

Mr. Burnham said the main problem facing the town is not the size of the council but the makeup of the code, which, while it has beautiful language, is too short and omits many powers and responsibilities the Council on Ethics should have.

The code also has no provisions about the use of public property by officials and no provision about the disclosure of confidential information, said Mr. Burnham. The Council on Ethics is given no authority to initiate investigations, it has no procedure for considering the acceptance of gifts by officials, and the current members of the council fear that these gaps may diminish the willingness of people to file a complaint.

“It is somewhat awkward or inappropriate for a commission to base its decisions on gut feeling,” he said, pointing out that Wilton’s Code of Ethics was last revised in March of 1983.

Mr. Brennan agreed that the town’s code was in need of review and explained the steps the Board of Selectmen has taken and will be taking to bring about revisions.

“I’m not comfortable with our current code,” said Mr. Brennan. “I think there are a lot of holes in it, to be frank.”

The selectmen have received a report on possible changes to the code from the three members of the Council on Ethics, and are considering options and suggestions of their own. Shortly, a five-member ad hoc committee will be charged with reviewing the code and proposing changes.

“We hope to have everything in place by early December,” said Mr. Brennan. The ad hoc committee would then be charged with coming up with a proposal within a set time period, and that proposal would be brought to a public hearing for citizen input, he said.

“Ethical issues can creep up on you in a number of ways,” said Mr. Brennan, adding that in August he sent a booklet to all town officials from the Connecticut Council of Municipalities that covered many of the typical ethical situations encountered by elected officials.

Questions

Residents in attendance had many questions regarding proposed changes and the current system.

One man asked about the recent case involving Second Selectman Marilyn Gould, in which the Council on Ethics determined a substantial personal interest did exist, after which she was asked to write a disclosure letter by the Board of Selectmen.

“I was confused, because the council, I thought, had found that there was an ethical violation,” but nothing seemed to be done about it, the man said.

Catharine Kempson, the league’s moderator for the night, explained that specific cases would not be discussed but that the panelists could answer the question in generalities.

Mr. Burnham explained that the council’s authority does not extend to meting out punishment, and that under the code, it serves as an advisory board to the selectmen, providing input on whether there is the appearance of a substantial interest, not whether there is an actual violation.

John Dempsey of DeForset Road, the resident who had filed the complaint against Ms. Gould, said that he saw other issues with the town’s code.

“Another potential hole is that the Board of Selectmen can take whatever action it deems advisable,” he said. Did the panel think it was incumbent on the selectmen to at the least initiate even a limited investigation and review of the Council on Ethics’ determination? he asked.

Mr. Brennan said that under the current code, the Board of Selectmen “is not required to make another investigation.”

Others, including Bob Faesy, asked how the town expected there to be a consensus on what the new code would look like, asking Mr. Williams how such documents are drafted.

“Typically a small group is appointed” to decide, said Mr. Williams. “That happened when we wrote a Declaration of Independence, it happened when we wrote the Constitution,” he said.

Mr. Brennan said he felt it was possible to have a new code written, and that he felt the basis for that code could be the town’s existing code.

Where Mr. Brennan and Mr. Sauer disagreed, however, was in how the code would be adjudicated. While Mr. Sauer pushed for a statewide model for the code, and suggested final decisions be made by an impartial board in Hartford, Mr. Brennan said he favored home rule, and did not like the idea of a state-mandated code.

“I want a simple and clear code, not like the state’s, which is 40 pages,” said Mr. Brennan. “I don’t want what my associate said, is that adjudication should go to Hartford. Anything that goes to Hartford goes into a black hole.”

Oct 6, 2005
Gould chides ethics chairman: Claims Burnham has conflict of interest

Second Selectman Marilyn Gould, the subject of an ethics investigation, has now publicly accused Council on Ethics Chairman Paul Burnham of having his own conflict of interest in the case.

Ms. Gould, who is contesting a conflict of interest charge regarding her role as a selectman, alleged in a letter to The Wilton Bulletin Tuesday that Mr. Burnham has professional ties with John Dempsey, who filed the complaint against Ms. Gould last August. The complaint revolved around Ms. Gould’s use of the Wilton High School field house for community organizations with which she is involved as a member and as a businessperson.

In her letter, Ms. Gould said that she was “troubled” that Mr. Burnham has not chosen to recuse himself and that “any personal or professional collaboration creates an undeniable appearance of impropriety and a conflict of interest.”

Ms. Gould was responding to an open letter written by Mr. Burnham on Sept. 9 in which he acknowledged that he had “engaged indirectly, in some, but quite limited, professional collaboration” with Mr. Dempsey. The letter also stated that he and Mr. Dempsey have lived in Wilton for more than 10 years, have children approximately the same ages, and have both been active in community affairs.

In a phone conversation Tuesday, Mr. Burnham said that collaboration to which he alluded in his letter was the fact that a partner at his law firm Rucci, Burnham, Carta & Edelberg hired Mr. Dempsey as an expert witness in a fraud case. According to an e-mail sent to The Bulletin from Mr. Dempsey, Mr. Burnham’s firm hired his own business, Dempsey, Myers & Company LLP, to perform accounting services and litigation support services in April 2002.

“I was involved in this matter only peripherally,” Mr. Burnham said. “The matter concluded a few months later, now more than two years ago. There has been no other professional collaboration.”

Mr. Burnham said that when he was appointed to the council in August, the members of the Board of Selectmen knew that Mr. Burnham, a former longtime Board of Finance member, had been involved in Wilton for several years and that his wife, Karen Birck, is a member of its Board of Education.

Mr. Dempsey said in a phone interview Tuesday that he filed the complaint against Ms. Gould two weeks before Mr. Burnham was appointed to the Council on Ethics. He also said that he advised the then-chairman, Laurence Mauer, that the two had personal and professional contacts over the years that warranted disclosure.

“When Mr. Burnham was appointed, I wrote to the council and disclosed these past relationships. The council as a whole agreed that these relationships would not pose any conflicts,” Mr. Dempsey said. “Now Ms. Gould is publicly accusing the chairman of a conflict of interest and she has never once filed a disclosure about her own.”

Mr. Dempsey also said in his e-mail that he had been acquainted with Mr. Burnham and his wife for several years through the Wilton Congregational Church. According to the e-mail, his son worked in Mr. Burnham’s firm in 2003 as a summer legal assistant and, at Mr. Burnham’s request, he displayed a “Vote for Burnham” sign at his Danbury Road office during Mr. Burnham’s 2004 campaign for state representative.

In her letter, Ms. Gould also took issue with the new statement of procedures developed by the council to handle the case. She said that she is challenging what she believes to be “improperly adopted” procedures that “violate both the charter provisions governing the Council on Ethics and fail to protect the due process rights of myself and potentially other citizens of the Town of Wilton.”

“The procedures drafted by the Ethics Council, without any public input, apply only to me rather than uniformly to all the townspeople of Wilton. Why?” Ms. Gould said.

According to an e-mail from Mr. Burnham, the “insinuation that the Statement of Procedures were crafted in a less-than-evenhanded manner, is misplaced.”

Ms. Gould manages a Wilton-based company, MCG Antiques Promotions Inc., which is private and for profit. The company has used the field house for antiques shows for the Drum Hill Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, the John Corr Memorial Scholarship Fund, and the Wilton Kiwanis Club. Ms. Gould is a member of all three organizations. She is also the paid executive director of the Wilton Historical Society, which rents the field house for its annual antiques show.

The Council on Ethics will meet tonight, Oct. 6, beginning at 7:30 in the town hall annex meeting room to discuss Ms. Gould’s latest letter.