Finance board hopefuls assess city’s fiscal state

STAMFORD — The Board of Finance gets its power from its authority over the mayor’s spending of taxpayer money.

The six members approve amounts the mayor wishes to spend or transfer between accounts, and how much he wants to borrow. They also may cut his annual budget.

This year the terms of three finance board members expire, and on Nov. 5 voters will choose people to replace them. There are six candidates — two incumbents and four who would be newcomers to the board.

The candidates were asked to assess financial management by Mayor David Martin, a Democrat first elected in 2013 and now in a second term that expires in 2021.

The three Republican candidates, Fritz Blau, Andrew Krill and Christopher Woodside, said the

administration needs a better plan for curbing expenses.

Blau: Pay too high

Blau, 52, chairman of the city’s Republican Town Committee and manager of a Stamford auto repair business, targeted staff size and salaries. Last year, onethird of the nearly 3,300 fulltime city employees earned $100,000 or more, not counting police extraduty pay, according to payroll data. It was a 16 percent increase over the previous year.

“The administration needs to lead by example and do more with less. There are entirely too many managers and they are overpaid,” Blau said. “The mayor's cabinet has exploded in size and salary. Are we governing ourselves or can we not determine our destiny?”

Woodside: Taxes a burden

His fellow Republican, Woodside, a 25yearold teacher at Trinity Catholic High School who ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for a Board of Representatives seat two years ago, said the administration has not “responsibly managed the fiscal health” of the city.

“Property taxes are going up as the values of properties are going down, and we have not seen the upkeep in services to go with it,” Woodside said. “I recently talked to a couple who had to move out of Stamford because they can’t afford to stay. They were older folks who worked in the city their entire lives. But I’ve heard it across the age spectrum.”

A mold infestation in school buildings, which led to the temporary closure of Westover Magnet Elementary and a doubling of the debt limit so the city can borrow tens of millions of dollars needed to make other schools watertight, illustrates the approach of this administration and others before it, Woodside said.

“We’re taking the hit now for things that weren’t managed in the past,” he said. “It seems like there’s no longterm plan. We’re just living tax season to tax season.”

Krill: Curb spending

Krill, 60, a sales trader, cited successes overseen by the mayor of the opposing party.

“I think Mayor Martin has done a good job growing the city’s Grand List from its lows of 2012 to where we are now, but he needs to do a much better job with the spending side of the equation,” Krill said.

An example is Martin’s decision to raise the minimum wage for city employees beyond the state requirement, he said.

“Getting ahead of the curve will only be used to bump up the city’s public union costs and put more small businesses out of business,” Krill said. “We have to start looking at what these costs do to home equity in Stamford. Why are we making families that have lived here for generations move because they can’t afford to live here anymore? What does it say to prospective homebuyers?”

He thinks the administration “needs to be a lot more vocal about the parasitic policies coming from Hartford,” Krill said. Such policies have “already driven three out of our four top cities into bankruptcy and I think we owe it to the people of Stamford to fight to make sure we’re not the fourth.”

The Democratic candidates mixed praise with some criticism.

Kooris: Some good moves

David Kooris, 39, an urban planner who works as deputy commissioner of the state Department of Economic and Community Development and was a city representative for two years, said Martin’s team

has undertaken difficult efforts to limit spending, such as privatizing a cityowned nursing home four years ago.

“This administration, with the support of the Board of Finance, has made several smart choices that have limited obligations and future exposure, including the privatization of Smith House, strategically shifting program management to nonprofit service providers, and controlling longterm labor benefit costs through contract negotiation,” Kooris said.

During the Martin administration, development has helped cap tax increases for residents, Kooris said.

“Economic growth has generated building permit fees, transfer tax revenue, and groundless growth that has allowed for enhanced public services,” he said, with a caveat.

“That said, the tax increases proposed by this administration would have been untenable but for the reductions achieved by the boards of finance and representatives,” Kooris said. “The administration needs to even further control costs.”

Rinaldi: More controls

Mary Lou Rinaldi, 66, a semiretired human resources professional who has been a finance board

member for 24 years and was a city representative for 16 years, praised the administration for setting aside money to cover the costs of pensions and retirement benefits for city employees — obligations that have driven other cities into the red.

“This is a huge accomplishment which has finally stopped the city from ‘kicking the can down the road’ for shortterm gains, thereby ignoring the true future costs,” Rinaldi said. “It is this effort which has contributed in part to the city’s regaining its AAA rating and allowed it to bond capital projects at much lower interest rates.”

But the administration can run a tighter ship, Rinaldi said.

“Given the periodic instances of thefts, missteps, contract lapses and dubious hiring practices, I really want to see the administration pay greater attention to its own policies, procedures and internal controls,” she said.

She called for an organizational review of all city departments.

“Rather than continuing to just hire more employees, I believe a wellexecuted review would help to streamline government, achieve the proper employee skill set needed for the 21st century, create greater efficiencies and provide better services to its citizens,” she said.

Alswanger: Watch and see

Geoff Alswanger, 53, a former Board of Education president who worked as chief financial officer for various tech companies and now runs the longtime family business, Long Ridge Camp, said he would like to wait for an inside look before issuing a critique.

“The city administration certainly has many competing interests to balance and I believe we all have to acknowledge that,” Alswanger said. “Should I get elected to the Board of Finance, I can be in a position to help provide effective oversight of city finances and will also be in a much better position to help answer the question of city financial management.”

Finance board members hold office for four years on a staggered schedule. This year, terms for Rinaldi, Kooris and Democrat Dudley Williams are up, but Williams is not running for reelection. The terms of incumbents Richard Freedman, a Democrat, and Sal Gabriele and Kieran Ryan, both Republicans, are not up this year.