CT will pick up $6.5M tab for a local school project. Here’s why.

Local officials learned in March that the town owed $6.5M to the state because the school was too big for enrollment

Connecticut officials are still coming to grips with many of the decisions that Konstantinos “Kosta” Diamantis made during his six-year stint overseeing the state’s school construction office, and towns and cities continue to learn that they could bear the cost for following his orders.

The latest fallout took place in Tolland, where local officials were quietly informed earlier this year that the town owed the state nearly $6.5 million for the Birch Grove Elementary School, which was rebuilt in 2019 after the school’s foundation was found to be crumbling.

That project was prominently featured in the federal criminal indictment that was filed earlier this month against Diamantis, a former state lawmaker and state deputy budget director.

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Federal prosecutors accused Diamantis of using the emergency status for that elementary school project to award multimillion-dollar construction contracts to a pair of companies that were paying him bribes.

But that was not the only way that Diamantis allegedly abused his unchecked power over the school construction program, according to state officials. 

The Department of Administrative Services, which inherited the billions of dollars in school construction projects that Diamantis oversaw, informed Tolland in March that the town needed to repay the state because Birch Grove Elementary was too large for the school’s projected student enrollment.

Agency officials said state law did not allow them to cover the additional costs associated with the oversized project.

In a lengthy response, Tolland officials desperately explained that Diamantis — who is facing 22 federal counts including bribery, extortion and lying to the FBI — gave the town permission to build the 85,000-square-foot school and openly encouraged that design on several occasions.

Walter Willett, Tolland’s superintendent, cited communications and several meetings in 2019 in which Diamantis repeatedly promised town officials that the Birch Grove project would “not be subject” to the “space standards” that are required for most state-funded schools.

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According to Willett, Diamantis said Birch Grove Elementary was not a “normal” school construction project and would not need to comply with the typical rules of Connecticut’s school construction program.

But that is not what the current leadership at DAS told Tolland when the state completed its final audit for the elementary project in March.

According to an email obtained by The Connecticut Mirror, DAS advised Tolland officials that the agency could not unilaterally waive the $6.5 million owed for oversizing the school.

Without mentioning him by name, a spokesman for DAS blamed the financial dispute between Tolland and the state on Diamantis, who exited state government in late 2021 shortly after he became the focus of the federal criminal investigation.

“This is an example of a former employee going beyond his designated authority to grant a district a waiver upon which the district relied,” Leigh Appleby, the DAS spokesman, told the CT Mirror.

Appleby emphasized that auditing the Tolland project and citing the town for the oversized school was required by state law and was all part of the agency’s efforts to “restore public confidence” in the school construction program.

“While we of course sympathized with the district, we had no statutory ability to unilaterally waive impermissible expenses.” he said. “In recent years, we have taken significant steps to restructure and improve the school construction grant and audit processes.”

Rep. Tammy Nuccio, R-Tolland, said she was incredulous when she heard earlier this year that the state was trying to recoup money from the town for a project that Diamantis micromanaged to the point that he was criminally charged with steering contracts to preferred construction companies.

“I have no idea how the footprint of the school was enlarged, but Kosta was pushing for it and telling us this was his project, and if we didn’t do what he wanted, we wouldn’t get reimbursed by the state,” Nuccio said. “So if there was any wrongdoing or mistakes, then the state should have to cover what Kosta ordered and approved.”

Attorney Vincent Provenzano, who is representing Diamantis in the federal case, declined to comment on the DAS statement or the audit findings.

Tolland is not the first municipality to learn that the state would not honor Diamantis’ promises.

Farmington, Hartford and New London were also informed in the past two years that the instructions they previously received from Diamantis were wrong and did not comply with state law.

In each of those instances, state lawmakers stepped in to pass special legislation that allowed DAS to cover the ineligible costs associated with the projects.

That is exactly what lawmakers did this year for Tolland, too.

While it went unrecognized during the legislative session, state lawmakers tucked a single sentence into a 258-page bill that, if signed by Gov. Ned Lamont, will allow Tolland to keep the money the state previously said it owed.

Appleby, the DAS spokesman, said the agency encouraged lawmakers to provide that financial relief to the town. He also suggested that DAS auditors might find additional cases in the future where Diamantis overstepped his authority and made promises to municipalities that ignored state law.

“As we have done with similar issues in the past — and will continue to do as matters like this arise going forward — we worked with relevant legislators, and we were in full support of making the district whole through the legislative process,” he said.

The only fair outcome in Tolland’s case, Nuccio said, was for the state to forgive the town’s debt.

“There was clearly interference by Kosta, and we shouldn’t have to pay for that,” she said.

Dave Altimari and Andrew Brown are reporters for The Connecticut Mirror (https://ctmirror.org/ ). Copyright 2024 © The Connecticut Mirror.