New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Rossi: Possible ‘irregular’ use of fed funds found
WEST HAVEN — After reviewing “many” of the city’s federal CARES Act expenditures, Mayor Nancy R. Rossi said Friday that she has “come across several large expenditures that cause me great concern,” and will pursue a forensic audit.
“Some of these expenditures appear improper and may be potentially fraudulent,” Rossi said in a video posted to the city’s Youtube page.
She said the city will “move forward with a thorough investigation and audit.”
“After reviewing the expenditures, I sus
pect that some of these funds may have been diverted and not used for the purpose for which they were intended,” said the mayor, who is a certified public accountant.
Rossi said she had spoken to the city’s independent public accounting firm, “which, after its review, agreed that these transactions are suspicious and need further investigation.”
“I assure all of our residents that if the investigation proves any wrongdoing, and fraudulent activity, I will demand anyone involved be held accountable and be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” Rossi said. If anyone is found guilty they should go right to jail.”
Following the release of the video, Rossi declined to share whether any City Hall employees had been suspended pending an investigation.
“I don’t want to get into too much detail because I was told not to,” she said.
Charles Grady, a spokesman for FBI New Haven, confirmed that agents visited West Haven City Hall Friday but would not confirm the existence of any federal investigations.
Rossi declined to say whether investigators were in City Hall Friday, but said she hadn’t “seen anyone I didn’t know” at City Hall that day.
“I’m sick to my stomach after hearing this,” said City Council President Ron Quagliani, D-At Large, after the mayor’s announcement. “I think everybody should do everything they possibly can to ensure a full and transparent investigation takes place.”
Quagliani, a former police chief for the city, said he has “seen some pretty rotten things” in 35 years in law enforcement, but “this makes the list.”
“When the facts come out, if there are people culpable, they’ve got to go,” he said. Quagliani said that, if the investigation were to find any city employees responsible, he believes they should be terminated, criminally prosecuted and made to pay restitution.
Barry Lee Cohen, a 10th District City Council member and the Republican candidate challenging Rossi for her job in November’s election, said any fraudulent uses of money “happened on her watch, period.”
“She keeps reminding people that she’s a CPA and takes credit for balanced budgets, however she also has to take responsibility for questionable activity,” he said. “I am hopeful for a quick and accurate resolution to this matter. Integrity, honesty, ethics and trust must be quickly restored to City Hall.”
John Lewis, Rossi’s opponent in last month’s Democratic primary, made the spending of pandemic relief funds a key element of his campaign against the mayor — arguing that the spending of the money was not transparent to the public and that some of that money should not have been used as payment for compensatory time for supervisory employees working above their hours last year. He said he did not understand why Rossi was discovering allegedly fraudulent payments when his campaign had raised questions for weeks.
“It seems like originally she said everything is legal, and it turns out there may be discrepancies,” he said.
Former Mayor Ed O’Brien, who was to run for the mayor’s seat in November’s election on a minor party ticket but will not be on the ballot due to a filing error, said Friday in a message that “West Haven Taxpayers deserve transparency, honesty and accountability.”
Rossi said Friday that she stands by the use of relief funding to pay City Hall employees for working above their contracted hours on pandemic-related tasks as a legal use of the funds.
Earlier this week, state Office of Policy and Management Secretary Melissa McCaw said her office would engage outside auditors to look into claims made by a group of four residents calling themselves Citizens Against Reckless Expenditures that relief funding was spent improperly and that city officials were not responding to public information requests in a timely manner.
Rossi said that low staffing in City Hall means only one paralegal is working on public information requests on top of his other duties.
“Sometimes it does take work,” she said.
However, she said Friday that she “may look into” making a hire to expedite the processing of public information requests.