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Derby City Hall.
DERBY – The creation of the annual city budget is underway but a key player in the process seems to be missing: the city’s finance director.
Agata Herasimowicz was not in Derby City Hall for most of the week. She is the finance director who started working for the city in July.
Her absence in and of itself isn’t unusual – but any questions about her are being referred to the city’s lawyers.
That’s unusual.
When reached at her house Friday evening, Herasimowicz said she did not want to nor was she allowed to talk to a reporter, and referred questions to the Derby mayor’s office. She indicated The Valley Indy had inaccurate info, but did not elaborate.
Earlier
On Tuesday and Wednesday, The Valley Indy reached out to Mayor Rich Dziekan and his chief of staff Walt Mayhew with questions about Herasimowicz.
On Wednesday night The Valley Indy submitted a Freedom of Information request seeking a week’s worth of communication between the mayor’s office and Herasimowicz.
On Friday, The Valley Indy reached out to Dziekan asking whether Herasimowicz is working normally for the city.
Dziekan said it was a personnel matter that is in the hands of the corporation counsel – so The Valley Indy emailed corporation counsel Vin Marino.
Marino didn’t respond, but his law firm sent a letter Friday afternoon signed by John Marini, another lawyer in Marino’s firm. The letter said Derby’s government needed more time to review the information requested by The Valley Indy on Wednesday.
If Not Now, When?
Immediately upon receiving the letter, The Valley Indy messaged Marini seeking clarification. He did not provide a deadline as to when the public information would be released.
“The City has no comment at this time. However, I’ll be working with the Mayor’s office to provide you with any materials that might be responsive to your FOI request, and hope to give you an update on that early next week,” Marini said.
The Valley Indy also messaged Alderwoman Sarah Widomski, asking if anyone had informed the Board of Aldermen/Alderwomen about the situation with the finance director. Widomski is the board’s president. She answered “no.”
The Valley Indy also reached out to Alderman Charles Sampson, but did not hear back as of Friday afternoon.
Derby Finances
The finance director is Derby’s chief fiscal officer, an important role in any city, but especially important in Derby.
Mistakes in Derby’s budget going back years resulted in a budget deficit, which caused the city to raise taxes, sell assets, temporarily reduce pension plan contributions, and restructure debt.
The budget problems brought Derby under the eye of the Municipal Finance Advisory Commission, an eight-person entity that checks-in on cities in bad fiscal shape.
The finance department itself is understaffed. Herasimowicz is the sixth Derby finance director since 2009. Her job is anything but easy.
Derby has a long list of fiscal practices that need to be addressed – issues that have been known about for years. Example – the city constantly misses deadlines to file annual audits.
She said at a recent public meeting that getting the finance department practices fully up to snuff would take several years. And those repairs to the financial practices have to happen as Herasimowicz does the normal, day-to-day activities of a finance director.
The Dziekan administration specifically hired Herasimowicz because of her experience. It’s part of a push by the Dziekan administration that has been supported in a bi-partisan manner by the Board of Aldermen/Alderwomen to put better qualified candidates in key positions in city government, and pay competitive salaries.
The city’s tax board, the group that sets the mill rate and votes on the Derby budget, is scheduled to meet Tuesday. It remains to be seen whether Herasimowicz will be participating.
