After multiple requests to Newtown Ethics Board Chair Jacqueline Villa to explain how she learned the contents of a sealed envelope full of hearing ballots, the official, via e-mail, agreed to discuss the issue at an August 4 meeting of her board. But after more than 90 minutes and a motion to adjourn, Ms Villa never raised the issue.

Upon adjournment, Ms Villa was asked to honor her word and explain how she was able to ascertain the breakdown of votes from two April 18 hearings that were introduced at a subsequent meeting on May 18, despite the fact that she never accessed the envelope that remained sealed and in the possession of her board secretary until May 26.

Her reply - a swift and definitive, "No comment."

Ms Villa's apparent knowledge of the envelope contents, and the introduction of those contents at a meeting eight days before the envelope was unsealed, is the subject of a Connecticut Freedom of Information appeal and hearing scheduled for August 18.

In lieu of a public explanation by Ms Villa, the FOI appeal seeks to determine if voting conducted to find whether two former Board of Education members violated local ethics rules was done during two executive or secret deliberation sessions held on April 18, or whether the ethics chair privately contacted or polled members between April 18 and May 18 to ascertain how they voted.

On a related matter, Ms Villa did conduct an exercise on August 4, to publicly "affirm" voting that was done in secret on April 18, and introduced via an amendment during the aforementioned May 18 ethics board meeting.

In going through the motions of publicly polling each ethics board member involved in the April 18 hearings - albeit four months later - she explained that the actions would invalidate a separate FOI appeal regarding the secret balloting process.

In turn, each board member read aloud their votes on each of the ethics violations with member Parker Reardon articulating his votes by phone, and the absent Tom Fuchs affirming his votes in writing.

In other business, the ethics board spent nearly an hour reviewing 132 pages of e-mails that were requested by Kathy Hamilton, one of the original ethics complaint respondents who is engaged in her own series of FOI appeals against the ethics panel and its chair. During the review, members stated that the bulk of the details in those e-mails involves scheduling of fact-finding meetings and other routine business.

Ms Hamilton's name also came up in a separate discussion regarding process and procedures, resulting in several members of the board volunteering to research complaint procedures, internal ethics procedures, and hearing processes.

Before the meeting adjourned, ethics board member Suzanne Kopp expressed concern about comments made by members of the Board of Selectmen, who took the board to task over an apparent lack of fact finding leading up to the multiple findings of violation against Ms Hamilton and former school board member David Freedman.

Ms Kopp defended her board, saying selectmen did not understand ethics board procedures, and that in meetings leading up to the findings of probable cause against Ms Hamilton and Mr Freedman, her board spent "hours and hours reviewing procedures."

"We're very proud that we followed the [ethics] code," Ms Villa said. "I think we would put the board of selectmen at ease if they knew we did our due diligence."

Ms Kopp said she was concerned because of "a disconnect between what we did and what the public thinks we did."

Ms Villa said that her board is taking the necessary first steps by doing research to improve the board's procedures.