Convinced that the city’s Retirement Board knowingly failed to abide by the state’s opening meetings act, the attorney general has brought suit against the city in Superior Court.
In a release …
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Convinced that the city’s Retirement Board knowingly failed to abide by the state’s opening meetings act, the attorney general has brought suit against the city in Superior Court.
In a release issued this week, Attorney General Peter Kilmartin said the lawsuit cites the board “for a willful or knowing violation of the Rhode Island Open Meetings Act [OMA]” when it held a meeting on less than 48 hours notice and discussed at a closed session “that should have been discussed in public.”
The suit brought an instant reaction from the administration that claims any violation of the law was not deliberate and amounted to an oversight.
“The city and the Warwick Retirement Board strongly disagrees with the findings of the Department of the attorney general. This case involves a simple clerical error made in the notice by a clerk who did not knowingly or willfully attempt to violate the Open Meetings Law,” interim Chief of Staff William DePasquale said in a statement in response to questions.
Former Ward 1 Councilman and School Committee chairman Robert Cushman brought the issue to the attorney general’s attention. Cushman, who has closely followed city finances and believes that legacy costs including pension and other post-employment benefits continue to reduce the city’s ability to fund capital improvement and new programs, questioned why the public had not been given adequate notice that the city’s actuary, Joseph Newton, would be addressing the City Council on March 16. The Retirement Board met with Newton in a closed session prior to speaking to the council. Reportedly, in that session Newton reviewed the assumptions he used in arriving at the unfunded pension liabilities. He later outlined those same assumptions in the public council meeting.
As for the notice of meeting, the attorney general says the board failed to follow the 48-hour requirement for the meeting held March 4.
“I would never call a meeting that I know or thought was in violation of the law,” Board Chairman Alfred Marciano said in a statement released yesterday. “I am especially concerned that the Department of the Attorney General concluded that the retirement board’s discussion of pension funds investment strategy that drive assumed returns cannot be discussed in executive session. I expect the City Law Department will vigorously defend the Retirement Board’s actions in this case and we look forward to vindication.”
After concluding that the board violated the law occasions, reads the attorney general’s release, the office allowed the board the opportunity to address whether the violations were knowing or willful.
“By supplemental finding dated May 12, 2015, the Office concluded that both OMA violations were knowing or willful,” it reads.
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Bob_Cushman
Regarding the first violations, Warwick Retirement Board Chairman Alfred Marciano statement, “I am especially concerned that the Department of the Attorney General concluded that the retirement board’s discussion of pension funds investment strategy that drive assumed returns cannot be discussed in executive session”, and regarding the second, Chief of Staff William DePasquale continuing to state it was a “clerical error” is really disappointing on two counts.
The first reason is that Mr. Marciano statement isn’t true, the retirement Board was not found in violation for anything to do with discussing pension strategy in executive session. I along with other tax payers attended the March 18 meeting where pension investment strategy was discussed publically, as it should be.
The AG writes, “In fact, we indicated that we found insufficient evidence to conclude that the Board’s inappropriate discussion and action during its March 18 closed session meeting was not willful or knowing and allowed the Board an additional opportunity to address this issue. Notwithstanding this opportunity, the Board’s supplemental response still fails to adequately address this violation”.
That means the board had two opportunities to explain its actions to the AG after the complaint was filed and failed to do so.
The Attorney General found that the board had violated R.I. Gen. Laws 42-46-5(a)(7), which allows a public body to convene into executive session for “a matter related to the question of the investment of public funds where the premature disclosure would adversely affect the public interest”.
The complaint I filed was in regards to the second part of that sentence. The board went into executive session to discuss and accept pension assumption recommendation from the board’s actuary when two days earlier on March 16, Mr. Marciano and the board actuary Joseph Newton presented a document outlining all the assumptions and discussed those assumptions in a public hearing before the city council. The assumptions were already discussed and disclosed so there was no premature disclosure at the March 18 meeting and the discussion should have been public. I actually told the board that fact before we were asked to leave the conference room where the meeting was being held.
The AG stated that “specifically, we failed to see how ‘the premature disclosure would adversely affect the public interest’ and expressly noted that, at no point in our investigation, did the Board offer any argument, reasoning, or justification for how the executive session discussion ‘would adversely affect public interest’”.
This leads me to my second point and by far the most important. Mr. Marciano and Mr. DePasquale statements demonstrate the Board’s tactic to resort to unwarranted attacks on the Attorney General office. Instead of properly reading, understanding why they were found guilty of the Open Meeting law and taking responsibility for breaking it, this defiance doesn’t provide me nor should it anyone in the public with the any assurance that when the dust settles and when no one is paying attention, the Board won’t violate the law again.
Rather I would have hoped that the Chairman Marciano,Board member Councilwoman Vella-Wilkinson and Mr. DePasquale would have announced new procedures to be put in place and mandatory educational programs for members occur so this does not happen again.
This leads to my final point involving the City Council need to set new stringent qualification standards and back ground checks on any person serving on this and any other board in the city.
It’s time for the Warwick Retirement Board members to either take responsibility for these violations and either promise not to do them again or resign from the board and let new individuals be appointed who will ensure transparency to the public is a paramount principle of operation.
Friday, May 15, 2015 Report this