City Council Members Dispute Oppositions' Campaign Allegations

Darien City Council members spoke out during Monday’s to refute claims made against city practices in campaign literature and elsewhere during the weekend. 

Comments recently published on fliers and in other forums lambasted the city’s public safety management, economic development efforts and financial practices.

Mayor , as well Ward Six Alderman , Ward Two Alderman and Treasurer , strongly contested several of the claims.

“It is important to separate fiction from fact,” said McIvor, who chairs the and responded to allegations regarding the police department. 

According to a letter—mailed to Darien homes—from mayoral candidate , Weaver reduced the Darien police force by 20 percent despite an increase in crime. 

“That is absolutely incorrect,” McIvor said. “Our full strength is 37 sworn officers and remains at 37 sworn officers.” 

In January, the city began a that reduced the minimum number of patrol officers required per shift from five to four. However, the department still schedules five patrol officers per shift. 

The city’s goal is to save money by reducing the number of times the department must pull in a fifth patrol officer on overtime pay if someone who is already scheduled calls in sick.

Each month of the trial run, the police committee will review the plan’s effectiveness and its members have said that they will halt the trial at any time if it becomes a question of public safety. 

McIvor also referenced crime statistics that show the incidence of Part 1 offenses, which include property and violent crimes, has dropped 3.8 percent.

The same letter from Monaghan, which also promoted the candidacies of for city clerk, for Ward Two alderman and for Ward Four alderman, included pictures of land at 75thStreet and Cass Avenue, as well as Cass Avenue and Plainfield Road, emblazoned with the words, “City-owned property vacant for years. Darien needs economic development.”

After the city purchased the land at the end of 2006 and 2007, Weaver said developers told the city that the only businesses that would come in during the economic downturn were drug stores, banks or fast-food restaurants. Weaver said those limited options prompted the City Council to wait until the economy improved to develop the land. 

Because the properties—previously occupied by two gas stations and a dry cleaner—required environmental cleanup, Weaver said developers would not have purchased the land. BP is paying for remediation efforts on a lot it once owned, she said. A grant is fully subsidizing the cleanup for the dry cleaner.

“We knew it had to be a city government to step in and bundle these properties and get them ready for development,” she said. “… Had we not stepped in to purchase these properties, we would have had a vacant BP gas station sitting on the corner, boarded up, not cleaned up, no remediation done, for who knows how long." 

Weaver also addressed recent claims that the city took out a loan with a high interest rate to buy land a Shell station used to occupy. Chase Bank has signed a letter of intent to buy that lot for $2 million, which the city purchased in 2006 for $1.6 million. 

“We did not borrow money to buy that property,” she said. “We paid that $1.6 million out of cash on hand.” The city did take out a $1.4 million bond issue in 2007 for the BP property, which the city still owns, she said.

Monaghan’s letter also addressed the , which the City Council voted unanimously to approve during Monday night’s meeting. 

“We had to cut the budget because we were deficit spending, spending money we did not have coming in,” he wrote. 

Neither the fiscal year 2011 nor 2012 budgets run a deficit, treasurer Coren said. This year’s budget includes $12.3 million in revenue, with expenditures of $11.5 million.

The projected $800,000 surplus for 2012, added to an existing $3.4 million fund balance, created a fund balance of $4.2 million. 

The City Council then approved a transfer of $2 million to the capital projects fund. That fund supports projects such as street reconstruction and sidewalk replacement.

“What I find responsible is building the capital fund, building the savings and then using it for the needs of the residents,” Coren said.

The City Council members’ defense of their policies and decisions came on the eve of Tuesday's consolidated election. Monaghan and his running mates, who have campaigned under the name Team Darien, did not attend Monday night’s meeting.