Mayor Claims Auditors Have Found "Deficiencies" In BOE Audit

In reacting to a Board of Education press conference during which Board chairman Ted Raczka stated that "there is absolutely no financial impropriety in the Middletown School system," Mayor Sebastian Giuliano said that preliminary word from auditors reviewing last fiscal year's financial record for the Board of Education is that they have found "a number of deficiencies."

Giuliano was quick to add that "I don't think there's any criminality there."

At the press conference Raczka was clear about his pride in the financial record of the district.

"We are audited each and every year.  The Department of Education reviews that audit," Raczka said. "We've have not even had a letter chastizing us for anything wrong."

Giuliano said that the audit itself and any deficiencies which occur are "beside the point."

"The point is that the law is clear, and the law says that the City is the conduit through which all funds pass," Giuliano said.  He cited statute which he says trumps the contention of the Board of Education that they have autonomy over payroll and other fund disbursement.

"You have something called home rule," Giuliano said.  "Anytime another law clashes with the city charter, the courts inevitably side with the city charter."

Giuliano also bridled against the implication by Executive Director of the Connecticut Association of School Superintendents, Joseph Cirasuolo that Giuliano is not obeying the law, and with board member Bill Boyd that he is using the police for "political purposes."

"An employee of the Board of Education got assaulted and called police," Giuliano said.  "I'm insulted by the accusation that we set them up.  The point is, that in the workplace you don't put your hands on another person.  She (Business Manager Nancy Haynes) is due in court on November 18, and I don't think she's there for a tour.

"Where else, but in someplace like North Korea, would you have an administrator put her hands on an employee, get arrested and then remain in her position, while the person she assaulted is put on leave," Giuliano said.

Giuliano contends that the city has made a clear attempt to reconcile differences with the Board of Education, and while Raczka was making analogies to McCarthyism, Giuliano cited the Paris peace talks with the North Vietnamese.

"We were making a sincere effort with them to come to terms for peace," Giuliano said.  "And they were making plans to take over the entire country.  It's like the Board of Ed.  We go into negotiations in good faith only to find out that they are doing what they've always been doing."

Giuliano says that Judge Robert Holzberg hopes to have mediation between the Board of Education and the city completed by year's end, and that mediation is scheduled to begin at the end of November.