First Selectman Addresses

‘Misrepresentations’

To the Editor:

My faith in the intelligence of Newtown voters causes me to refrain from responding to most of the outlandish misrepresentations and allegations by aspiring candidates during the “silly season” before elections. However, two letters in the October 5 Letter Hive beg a response.

An Independent Party District 3 Council candidate stated [“Performance, Not Platitudes”] that the Fairfield Hills Authority “was created through legislative sleight-of-hand by Herb Rosenthal and Will Rodgers ….” This statement disregards the unanimous Legislative Council support to seek enabling legislation from the State Legislature to create the authority by local ordinance and the nearly unanimous council approval of the current Fairfield Hills Authority ordinance. This was widely publicized at the time, all votes were taken at public meetings, and there was a public hearing for the ordinance with little public opposition. It also denigrates the hard work of State Representative Julia Wasserman and State Senator John McKinney who achieved passage of the Special Act by a vote of 150 to 1 in the House and 36 to 0 in the Senate.

Fairfield Hills Authority powers are limited to primarily managerial functions of implementing the Planning and Zoning approved master plan. This is contrary to the often stated “Independent Party Line” alluded to in the candidate’s letter and expanded upon in a second letter [“Authority Has Too Much Power”], authored by a person who purports to be an IPN member. Her letter contains numerous misstatements about the powers of the authority.

The town sought special legislation because existing statutes for authorities convey more power than the town wanted for the Fairfield Hills Authority. A local example is the Water and Sewer Authority, also created under state statutes by local ordinance, which has much broader powers. Unlike the Water and Sewer Authority, the Fairfield Hills Authority can only spend funds available from annual budget appropriations approved by the Board of Selectmen, Board of Finance, Legislative Council, and the voters at referenda, or from leases approved by the Board of Selectmen. Also unlike the Water and Sewer Authority, encumbrances and other carryover of funds from year to year, referred to in the letter, have to be approved by the same process followed by all other town agencies.

The writer said that $1,550,000 revenue from the proceeds of the sale of houses (on Mile Hill Road South) was not returned to the general fund. That was because the Legislative Council and voters at a town meeting authorized the expenditure of those funds for the environmental cleanup of soil contamination. The expenditures were made by the finance director and first selectman, the purchasing authority, in conformity with town purchasing regulations. The expenditures were merely reported to the public via Fairfield Hills Authority meetings.

The same is true for expenditures of the $21 million of bond proceeds authorized by the voters in the 2001. Again, contrary to the letter writer’s assertion, the authority has no control over those funds.

I hope that this corrects some of the oft-repeated misstatements of the IPN and their associates.

Sincerely,

Herb Rosenthal

First Selectman

45 Main Street, Newtown                                      October 10, 2007