The finance committee of the common council debated, sort of, whether to reimburse Nick Kydes for the lawyer that he hired to defend himself against then fellow council member Kevin Poruban’s ethics complaint. As an appointed official myself, I have to agree with the conclusion of corporate counsel on the indemnification of elected and appointed officials.
“My information, again it’s from almost anecdotally, but it’s from people who told me things about past practice,” Maslan said. “My understanding has been when an official, like a council person, was the subject of a complaint, and the activity, or the conduct, or the action that is the focus of the complaint was the person actually acting in the capacity as council person, then the provision of the defense was automatic.”
Council Majority Leader William M. Krummel and Norwalk resident Diane Lauricella, also at the Finance Committee meeting, took strong issue with that assessment.
“The old code of ethics was silent on reimbursement for either complainant or respondent. The new code introduced a change in policy, to some extent,” Krummel said. “But the substantive changes in the new code were not made retroactive. What has been produced in the new code really does not apply to this case.
“I think clearly this was not allowed,” Krummel added.
Krummel once again is missing the bigger picture here. The old ethics code, and for that matter the new ethics code, isn’t the issue here. It’s the indemnification of officials that is the issue, and either you believe that all actions of officials should be indemnified or not. Normally, if an official is the subject of a lawsuit, the city legal department handles the defense work.
In the case of an ethics charge, especially one brought by another official it is obvious that the city’s legal department can’t defend the official for a variety of reasons–starting with not wanting the city of be in the position of defending potential unethical behavior. I don’t think any government that relies on council members who get paid $50 a month or appointees that are 100% volunteer could function without blanket indemnification.
So the issue becomes, the cost of a private defense action.If Krummel had been thinking he might have realized that by objecting to the indemnification he would be exposing Kevin Poruban to having to defend himself against a Kydes counter charge, since Poruban clearly broke the confidentiality cone of silence when he released the complaint to the press.Meanwhile Anne Carbone should be paying attention to the corporation counsel’s argument here, since an earlier ethics charge filed against her also seems to fall under the same issue of a complaint filed against an official carrying out duties of office.There’s financial issue here, is something that it seems only Amanda Brown picked up on.
When the vote came, Hilliard, Richard J. Bonenfant, Michael K. Geake and Douglas E. Hempstead voted in favor of the reimbursement request. Douglas W. Sutton abstained from the vote. Amanda M. Brown, a paralegal, took issue with the cost of Kydes’ legal defense and voted no.
“I was hoping that it wouldn’t pass,” Brown said. “But since I’m obviously outnumbered in this, I just want to say for the record that I would have hoped that you all would have taken at least some kind of discount in this bill, because $13,000 is excessive for this bill.”
The city should be able to cap what legal fees are incurred in the defense of its officials. To not address this particular point at the finance committee level is pretty outrageous. There appears to be a lack of interest in a healthy debate about legal contingency funds, and omissions and liability insurance should an extraordinary circumstance develop.Political flunkies should perhaps spend a bit more time focused on the business of government instead of the party and personal politics that seem to overshadow common sense.
source: The Hour, Finance: Reimburse Kydes, February 22, 2008
