Bipartisan RTM Approves Cooke-DaRos Settlement

In a 21 – 2 bipartisan vote, the Representative Town Meeting (RTM) last night approved a final legal settlement between the town and landowner Wayne Cooke that will now end Cooke’s litigation against Unk DaRos, the former first selectman, and Tax Assessor Barbara Neal.

Over the past week, the Board of Selectman (BOS), the Board of Finance (BOF), an RTM committee, and now the RTM met all met in executive session, behind closed doors to hear the town’s attorneys and the attorney for the town’s insurance carrier present a variety of legal scenarios in the event the cases went to trial. Click here to read the story.

In the end, all three town boards voted to settle two cases, a federal civil rights suit and a state defamation case. And while they could not by law discuss the details, the RTM members repeated a general theme — that a settlement was in the best interest of the town and the taxpayer for a variety of reasons. 

Attorneys for the town and the Marcus Law Firm signed off on a settlement in U.S. District Court in New Haven more than two months ago, on Sept. 22. The settlement required town approvals. So over the last five business days the BOS, the BOF, and the administrative services committee of the RTM met and heard the town attorneys lay out the issues. Then each board with few dissents approved the general settlement. DaRos has previously blasted the decision to settle the cases.

The settlement gives Cooke and his attorneys a total of $500,000, split between the town and the town’s insurance company. It also comes with a controversial tax package that returns Cooke’s farm status to his property, thereby considerably lowering his taxes, even for years he did not farm. Neither the town assessor nor tax collector was consulted about their views. 

The two lawsuits were filed two years ago, in November 2012, and were the culmination of an ongoing feud between DaRos and Cooke, a feud that produced raucous public meetings over many years, and even reached into DaRos’s final election campaign. Click here and here and here to read previous coverage.

The RTM’s special session last night began at 8 p.m. in the community room at Branford Fire Headquarters. Seven of the 30 members were absent as Moderator Dennis Flanagan moved the meeting into executive session. Attorneys Bill Aniskovich and Carolyn Korn represented the town; Attorney Thomas R. Gerarde, represented the town’s insurer. The three sat at a table facing the RTM for about an hour. 

Cooke is represented by the David Doyle of the Marcus Law Firm, a firm that once served as town counsel of Branford and now represents a plaintiff in lawsuits against the town.

RTM Members Voice Views 

Chris Sullivan, the former Democratic moderator of the RTM who succeeded in re-establishing Roberts Rules of Order at the RTM after Cooke repeatedly disrupted meetings, voted for the settlement, taking the pragmatic road, he said. He now serves as the RTM’s Democratic minority leader.

“I don’t enjoy the feeling that I have that we are rewarding the behavior and the actions of the plaintiff (Cooke) tonight. It certainly makes it not an easy vote. It is probably the most difficult of my time as a member of the RTM. I say that knowing that I don’t agree with everything in the settlement but in my work as a risk assessor I know that minimizing potential exposure to the town is the chief objective.”

First Selectman Jamie Cosgrove was pleased that both sides of the aisle agreed to the settlement. In an interview with the Eagle, he said, ​“It was great that the vote received bipartisan support. A majority of people were able to put aside personalities. This isn’t about claiming victory or admitting defeat. It is truly doing what is in the best interest of the town and the citizens of the town. And I think that shows by the amount of bipartisanship we saw tonight.”

Ray Ingraham, the Republican majority leader of the RTM, reviewed how the finance and select boards so far had acted in a bipartisan way. ​“Although we disagree on many things,” he said of the political parties ​“we came to the conclusion that the settlement is in the best interest of the town. There are personalities in these decisions. We all have loyalties to political parties but we are elected to make decisions for the benefit of the town. It is time to move ahead…”

The Republicans hold a majority on the RTM and all voted in favor of the settlement last night. Two Democrats voted against settlement, Josh Brooks of Stony Creek and Ali Abulugma of Short Beach.

In voting no, Brooks stood to say, ​“I believe that everyone who knows me, and I have been on this body about seven years, knows that I vote what I believe every time. I will be voting against this settlement based on the belief that the case has no merit and is not based in fact. I have heard the discussion and I understand the financial aspects of it, but I believe in the morality aspect of it. And therefore I am voting no.”

Doug Hanlon, an RTM member from Short Beach, wanted to know what would happen if the RTM rejected the settlement, a settlement the town’s insurance carrier recommended. He was told at the session that if the town wanted to go forward to try the cases – against the town insurer’s recommendation – it would have to do so without the insurer’s financial help. This could mean a far greater legal bill than anticipated, especially for two lawsuits.

“In the end, if we didn’t settle, we could have lost more,” Hanlon said, adding he had permission to discuss this aspect of the case. 

In a subsequent press release from Cosgrove, Gerarde said the cases ​“were withdrawn without admission of any liability. But there was real risk here and I strongly recommended this settlement to Town Officials as something that was in their best interest.” Aniskovich, who worked with Gerarde and the Marcus Law Firm in arriving at a settlement, said in the press release that in his view ​“the record created in the tax appeal cases would have presented additional risk to the Town in the slander/civil rights cases with no guarantee of a successful outcome on any of the separate appeals.”

A Week of Meetings

Last week, in a prelude to last night’s meeting, the RTM’s administrative services committee met in executive session for more than two hours to hear the town’s attorneys and Cosgrove outline their reasons for settlement. Two of the seven committee members, Maggie Bruno and Clare Torelli, were absent. The remaining five RTM members voted unanimously to approve the settlement. About a dozen other RTM members attended the executive session where attorneys outlined various court scenarios that might well be harmful to the town.

The settlement talks began with the Board of Selectmen, the only board to vote on all three parts of the settlement: the tax appeals filed by Cooke against the town, the proposed $250,000 settlement the town’s taxpayers will pay and the insurance carrier’s $250,000 payment related to the cases. 

Democratic Third Selectman Bruce Storm voted for the major settlement, along with Cosgrove and Joe Higgins, Jr. but Storm voted against the tax portion of the settlement saying he did not think it was fair to other farmers. 

Next came the board of finance. Settling these lawsuits was difficult for many board members. But as BOF chair Joseph Mooney said of this difficult situation, ​“We had to take the personalities and the history out of it.” Other finance members concurred.

Kurt Schwanfelder, a member of the BOF, voted against the entire settlement, saying he had spent thirty years in service to the town of Branford, serving on a variety of boards and on the RTM and that he has always acted in the best interest of the town of Branford. ​“I can’t do it,” he said of accepting the settlement. The BOF voted 5 – 1 to recommend to the RTM that increase the general fund budget of $250,000 in order to fund the settlement.

Cooke’s Tax Cases 

Then there is settlement involving all of Cooke’s tax cases against the town. Cooke owed the town a total of $168,639 in back taxes, liens and interest from 2008 to November 2014, according to town records.

He paid none of his taxes over the course of his court cases and it is not clear why. Typically the town requires taxpayers who challenge their taxes in Superior Court to pay either 75 or 90 percent of their taxes depending upon their assessment while their court cases are pending.

Initially there were settlement discussions about possibly waiving about $200,000 of Cooke’s back taxes in their entirety. They were levied after Neal, the assessor, revoked Cooke’s farm status in February 2008 because he was not farming. He has admitted in his deposition he was not farming at that time. His taxes went from roughly $18,000 a year to $85,000 a year after he lost his farm status.

In the end, the settlement restored Cooke’s farm status to 2008 and his current back tax bill was adjusted to reflect that change. According to Cosgrove, Cooke has previously paid the town $30,526 in back taxes, which is part of an $80,000 back tax bill he owes the town. It is due at the end of this year. This bill is far less than it would have been had his beneficial farm status not been restored for the years he was not farming. He even received farm status for his Red Hill Road property, which a superior court judge ruled was not farm land.
 
​“I voted against the tax relief,” Storm said. ​“He is getting farm status, and they are collecting some back taxes to the tune of about $90,000 to $100,000.”

“So he is going to have to pay a sum of money to the town,” Storm said. ​“Still I don’t feel it is fair to all the other farmers. There were some information shared that showed that other farms have applied for this status but were treated differently than Cooke was. I needed to dig in my heels with regard to the tax relief. Because I don’t think it is fair for other people who can’t get that kind of relief.” 
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