Airport issue still calls for outside probe: Sikorsky Memorial (KBDR), Bridgeport, Connecticut

Published 6:57 pm, Thursday, August 1, 2013
CT Post

The mystery surrounding the $400,000 access road built last spring through Bridgeport-owned property at Sikorsky Memorial Airport to the home of a politically connected millionaire developer may never be completely unraveled.

Bridgeport Mayor Bill Finch's announcement Thursday that he fired airport manager John K. Ricci, whom he suspended with pay in July, was certainly a decisive step.

But holes gape still in the story of the road, which not only leads to the waterfront home of developer Manuel Moutinho, head of the well-known Mark IV Construction Co., but was also built by Moutinho's company after a farcical process of bid-waiving, an after-the-fact memo from the city attorney's office authorizing the waiver, the sudden appearance in the Purchasing Department file of the so-called bids, and so on.

To recap, Ricci, the airport manager, arranged for bids on the access road and for its construction. Normally the city's Purchasing Department would handle such matters.

Ricci's alleged usurpation of the bidding process was among the charges that the Finch administration bundled under the term "reckless and intentional misconduct" in a press release announcing the action.

Thursday, though, Ricci issued a statement that appeared on the blog "Only in Bridgeport," saying, essentially, that every step he took, including the solicitation of bids, was approved or at least noted by the Bridgeport City Attorney's Office and that his business relationship with Moutinho -- the grounds on which Finch initially suspended him from the $94,000-a-year job -- was, or should have been, well-known.

Ricci said he once recused himself at an Airport Commission meeting chaired by Finch when a Moutinho-related matter came up. According to the city attorney's office, the minutes of that meeting don't support Ricci's contention.Finch has vowed to tighten requirements for city department heads to disclose business relationships and to tighten sections of the city's Code of Ethics. And we can't lose sight of the fact that this sorry saga of the access road came up in the much larger context of a vital airport improvement project, that being the creation of a safety zone at the end of a runway. For years the city has been pushing for this and now is under the gun of a Dec. 31, 2015, deadline to finish.

Ricci, as he noted in his statement, has been a city employee for near 40 years, working under 10 of the last 11 mayors.

In June, we said this matter required investigation by an independent agency, whether it be the Bridgeport Police Department, the FBI, the Federal Aviation Administration or some other outside group.

Finch, as he promised, has taken action. But plenty of questions remain for an outside set of eyes to look at.

Source:   http://www.ctpost.com