The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Debate ongoing on probe of claim against Drew
MIDDLETOWN — Mayor Dan Drew has lashed out at the Common Council in advance of a report scheduled for likely release Monday night into whether he allegedly discriminated against a female city employee.
The investigation was undertaken following a complaint from a Board of Education employee who claimed she was unfairly denied a raise while three fellow employees received raises. The employee, Michele DiMauro, the school department’s human resource officer, charged Drew had personally intervened to block her from getting the raise.
Drew has denied that assertion.
In January, Drew said DiMauro, like her three colleagues, was offered a one-grade pay increase, but she demanded a least a two-grade increase. The matter was being handled internally until the head of the city office conducting the review became concerned because Drew is her direct supervisor.
After reviewing the compliant, the council voted 11-0 in January to commission the investigation, which has been conducted by New Haven attorney Margaret P. “Penny” Mason.
Drew recently sent a letter to the council denouncing both the background and several aspects of the investigation, which he has described as “a witch hunt.” He also posted the letter on his Facebook page.
In his three-page letter on the report, Drew contends: “This investigation was launched and conducted this way because I won’t engage in the patronage that some people have come to expect as their birthright. My standard for hiring is a person’s qualifications rather than connections.”
Drew also contends the council has exceeded powers granted it by the charter and has tolerated “inappropriate questions of the personal lives, political activities, and marriages of me” and several members of the city staff.
Drew’s decision to criticize the investigation before the report has been released has confounded some councilors.
“He’s reacting to something we have not seen,” Council Minority Leader Sebastian Giuliano said Friday. “I can’t find an explanation for what he’s doing,” he said of the mayor’s email.
Posting the criticisms of the report on Facebook has had a predictable result, Giuliano said.
“He has the support of ‘the usual suspects.’ He has the people who love him and the people who hate him. Well, duh, welcome to the world of politics,” he said.
Council member Deborah Kleckowski disagrees with Drew’s assertion he hires only the best people, she said, charging some people hired have no experience in fields in which they are being hired, while some city employees with long records of experience have been overlooked or ignored.
However, Kleckowski also said, “No one should be giddy about this report. It’s humbling for all of us.”
Giuliano rejected Drew’s assertion the council is conducting “a witch hunt” of him and his administration. “We’re not out to get you. The whole purpose of the investigation is to see if there are ordinances we need to adopt or to changes, as well as are there changes to the charter that we need to make?”
The council “has bent over backward to keep on the straight and narrow,” has “called the Freedom of Information Commission so often they’re probably tired of hearing from us,” and engaged a professional parliamentarian’s service to make sure its actions were correct, Giuliano said.
The council was to meet as a committee of the whole in a closed-door executive session to discuss the report Monday night, Giuliano said. Once that discussion ended, he expected the council to come out of executive session and take a vote whether or not to release the report.
“Precisely half of the twelves of you have now privately told me that you consider — and have always considered this investigation — to be out of bounds,” Drew wrote.
He contends DiMauro’s complaint should never have come to the council, but should have been dealt with by the state Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities.
In his letter to the council, Drew said that opinion is shared by several councilors as well.
“Several of you told me privately that allegations of gender discrimination never belonged with the common council but instead should have been filed with CHRO.”
Beyond that, Drew said Mason’s inquiry has strayed far — and inappropriately — from a focus on DiMauro’s claim.
“Members of our staff were asked about: their custody arrangements; marriages and divorces; political donations they’ve made on their own time and their own money and: political activities in which they’ve engaged on their own time and in their own homes,” Drew wrote.
Turning to his own interview with Mason, Drew said, “What I was not asked about was the substance of original complaint of gender discrimination, which is the only thing your investigator was actually hired to look into.”
The council so far has blocked appointment of three city employees — including a city clerk — until after they have seen the report.
In his letter Drew charges the council’s failure to act on those appointments “is having a real and detrimental impact on our ability to serve the public in the realms of both public safety and economic development.”
As a result, Drew said he will shortly call a special meeting to act on appointments of the deputy director of central communications and director of water and sewer as well his nominee for town clerk.
Drew did not a return phone calls requesting comment by press time.