New Council Members Start Off Easy

By John Voket

Newly elected members of the Legislative Council got off to a relatively easy start Wednesday evening as the panel met for its first postelection session. While a number of housekeeping concerns were handled, along with a cursory review of correspondence and some orientation, no controversial or critical business was transacted.

Second District newcomers, Republicans Patricia Llodra and Stacie Doyle, and Third District GOP councilman A. Jeffrey Capeci were on hand to endorse incumbent council chairman and fellow Republican Will Rodgers to continue in his leadership capacity for the next two years.

Democrat Timothy Holian was then elected to continue serving in his capacity as vice chairman. Ann Mazur was also welcomed back as the council clerk.

Newly elected First District representative Keith E. Jacobs was not in attendance according to Mr Rodgers, because he was on the West Coast attending to business matters. Republican Michael Iassogna was also called away to deal with an emergency business issue just before the meeting convened, Mr Rodgers informed the group.

Otherwise, the balance of incumbents including Democrats Francis Pennarola and Daniel Amaral and Republicans Joseph Di Candido, Joseph Borst, and David Brown were on hand to begin another two-year period of service as members of the community’s top elected local political body.

During the first part of the session, Mr Rodgers discussed a Monday afternoon meeting that was held regarding current and future budget concerns related to both the town and its school district. That meeting, Mr Rodgers said, focused primarily on how the pending high school expansion would impact the overall town spending plan and its future ability to borrow or bond for major capital projects.

“It was a general meeting discussing some ideas about the expansion. [First Selectman Herb] Rosenthal] was the driving force behind the meeting,” Mr Rodgers said.

Mr Rodgers told fellow council members that he and other town officials, including finance board chairman John Kortze and town finance director Ben Spragg, reviewed preliminary figures on projected costs for the expansion of the high school at its present location with School Superintendent Evan Pitkoff and school board chair Elaine McClure.

“Mr Rosenthal presented some preliminary calculations and various options principally about building a second building instead of putting an expansion on to the existing high school,” Mr Rodgers said. “It was prompted, I think, over various statements and public comments about the possibility of creating a new high school. I think that number scared some people down to their socks.”

Mr Rodgers said the Board of Education was asked to determine if a curriculum adjustment could be made to accommodate programming at two separate buildings, but the school board representatives were doubtful about that, he said. The chairman also reiterated public comments that were made at several recent selectmen and finance board meetings, that the expansion might be close to or obsolete, in terms of accommodating an increasing capacity of incoming students, by the time that expansion is completed.

Mr Holian added that Mr Kortze asked that town officials review the town Capital Improvement Plan to determine what Newtown could borrow while keeping within its self-imposed debt service cap limit.

“Rather than having the tail wag the dog, we might want to revisit the next five years of the Capital Improvement Plan and use that figure to determine exactly what we can do to solve our space needs,” Mr Holian said. “Whether or not that fell on deaf ears remains to be seen.”

Mr Rodgers than discussed a pending update of a source book that he was planning to circulate to the council, other town officials, and police officers, outlining all town ordinances and highlighting every ordinance violation that could result in a fine. He explained to the new council members that because of a recent ordinance that allowed the town to collect violation fines directly, that the police department might be in a better position to enforce some of the lesser ordinances that formerly would have resulted in fines going directly to the state.

“We actually asked our legal counsel to prepare that document for the police department first, before the general source book of all ordinances is prepared,” Mr Rodgers said. “I expect that source book will be ready in about a quarter year.”

The balance of the meeting dealt with requirements for members to serve on certain major and minor subcommittees, and other general responsibilities and rules of the council. The session adjourned shortly after.