Derby's Search For Economic Development Director Is Having Trouble Getting Past 'Go'

DERBY – The city’s effort to hire an economic development director is inching along through the bureaucratic process.

Derby hasn’t had a full-time economic director or grant writer since 2013.

The last person to hold the jobs full time was Sheila O’Malley, who now holds the titles in Ansonia, a city that has been receiving lots of grants for projects ranging from riverwalk construction to environmental cleanups of old industrial properties.

Mayor Rich Dziekan has Carmen DiCenso as part-time economic development liaison, but DiCenso also supervises the city’s parking garage and anti-blight program.

So Dziekan and the Board of Aldermen/Alderwomen have been working to create a job title, salary, along with a search committee to find a good applicant.

Hiring an economic development person seems to have support of Republicans and Democrats in Derby — it was supported by both mayoral candidates during the most recent election campaign. 

But it’s taking a while for the process to get rolling.

At a meeting on Jan. 13, the Board of Aldermen/women voted to send a job description and the general composition of a candidate search committee (the group to interview candidates) to an Aldermanic subcommittee.

At the subcommittee meeting on Jan. 27, there was a discussion of the composition of the search committee. The Aldermen/women had approved a general description of the spots to be filled, such as a certain number of Republicans and Democrats.

But Mayor Rich Dziekan and his chief of staff Walt Mayhew asked the subcommittee to slightly alter the makeup of the search committee from what the Alders approved Jan. 13 (apparently as an email to public officials not included in the meeting’s agenda packet posted for the public).

At the Jan. 27 subcommittee meeting, Sarah Widmoski, president of the BOA/A, noted that if the mayor or staff are going to alter something already voted upon by the full board, the full board should be notified.

After trying to remember what precisely the full BOA/A had sent to the subcommittee, the subcommittee voted to send the matters back to the full BOA/A.

So, on Feb. 10, the full Board of Aldermen and women took up the discussion, during which Alderwoman Anita Dugatto, chairwoman of the subcommittee, asked the matters to be sent back to the subcommittee.

Dugatto referenced a letter the Aldermen had received but that was not included in the meeting packet made available to the public prior to the meeting, which was held on Zoom.

The letter, which The Valley Indy requested from the town clerk after the meeting, was from Thomas Hyde, a Derby native who heads up the Naugatuck Valley Regional Development Corporation.

That’s the group that recently helped Naugatuck and Waterbury team up for a regional economic development project, and the group that recently partnered with the Naugatuck Valley of Governments, Seymour and Beacon Falls on a $10 million economic development grant application.

Hyde and his corporation want to be considered for the economic developer’s job in Derby.

However, Dugatto pointed out the job description isn’t written to include corporations, so the job description needed to go back to the subcommittee for another month to be edited. The Aldermen/Alderwomen voted to send it back by a 6 – 3 vote, with the Democratic majority all voting ​“yes.”.

Regarding the search committee, Dugatto noted on Feb. 10 that the makeup of the search committee wasn’t what the Aldermen and Alderwomen had approved on Jan. 13 – the same discussion that had happened on the subcommittee level on Jan. 27.

This touched off a disagreement between Dugatto and Aldermen Rob Hyder and Charles Sampson, who had different recollections than Dugatto on what actually was voted upon at the subcommittee meeting of Jan. 27.

The Valley Indy reviewed a recording of the Jan. 27 subcommittee meeting several times and was unable to clearly explain what they voted on.

Here’s the audio clip of the disputed motion from the subcommittee, which became a bone of contention at the Feb. 10 BOA/A meeting:

At the Feb. 10 full BOA/A meeting, the conversation centered on the process by which the search committee is being created, with Widomski and Alderwoman Barbara DeGennaro questioning why the composition of the search committee had been changed since voting on the makeup of the committee on Jan. 13.

Mayor Dziekan urged the board to create the search committee instead of pushing it off another month, but ultimately the makeup of the search committee was tabled by a motion put forth by Alderwoman Widomski.

The motion to table the matter was approved by a 6 – 3 vote, with the Democrats all voting to table.

Second Ward Alderman Gino DiGiovanni, a Republican elected in November, called the move ​“crazy.”

“It’s just mind blowing to me how we run around in circles and chase our own tails, and then we wonder why nothing gets done,” DiGiovanni said.