Interim CFO, Town Still Struggling to Reconcile Wilton’s Finances

Wilton’s temporary chief financial officer had few detailed answers for the Board of Selectmen on Monday night, Nov. 3, but he made it clear there was still a lot to do in getting the town’s Finance Department back on track.

Interim CFO Joseph Centofanti made a virtual appearance at the BOS meeting, offering selectpersons their first opportunity to ask questions since he started working for the town over two months ago.

While he offered little new information on the heels of his appearance in front of the Board of Finance on Oct. 14 — and while he was somewhat vague on details as to what has been completed under his watch — Centofanti indicated that Wilton’s trouble ultimately rests with management in relation to process, coupled with computer system confusions that continue to impact Town Hall.

Promises, Promises

First Selectman Toni Boucher had previously promised the BOS in-person appearances from Centofanti, along with reports and outlines of cost for his services — including a breakdown of any additional personnel from his firm. But details are still slow in coming.

It was finally revealed Monday night that Centofanti and his agent company, PKF O’Connor Davies, billed Wilton more than $17,000 for the month of September, but details of how the charges break down were not shared with BOS members. Boucher responded to questions from GMW following the meeting to say that, “The invoices from PKF O’Connor Davies PKF reflect the charges for the interim CFO and whatever staff he uses for his work for Wilton.”

Despite repeated questions from BOS members, even Centofanti’s rate is still unknown to the public, though the original contract with PKF said the town would be charged a “discounted hourly rate” of between $325 to $375 per hour for his services. 

Centofanti said that he has been working more than the eight hours of the one day each week he spends in-person at Town Hall, answering additional emails and phone calls.

“The hours are a good amount more than one day a week because that’s been the need,” he said.

He also said he has engaged other people from his firm, but could not specify the amount of hours they’ve worked, nor their rates.

“I use one person mainly,” Centofanti said in response to a question from Selectwoman Kim Healy. “I might have had some lower staff, but I use a manager to do some of this accounting that’s a little bit complicated to understand. I didn’t look up how much time she has put in, but her rate is definitely less than mine.”

Healy assured Centofanti that it was understandable, but pointed out that bringing on more personnel probably required an OK from the board.

“The board has not approved additional help … We should just probably approve that at some point, because the board hasn’t done that,” Healy said.

Responding indirectly, Boucher deflected Healy’s question.

“I just want to remind the board that you did all approve the hiring of this firm and the cost involved with hiring them to get the job done,” Boucher said, though there were no specific costs approved and the board was told that numbers would be provided after Centofanti began his work.

“We’ll give you a report on cost at this point and some anticipated cost, but again, that’s unknown at this time,” Boucher said, implying more would be shared at the next BOS meeting on Nov. 17.

Finance Forensics

Centofanti painted a picture of himself and the newly-hired Controller Tracy Haberman having to sift through a panoply of confusing accounting details, with Haberman simultaneously striving to train two new finance employees that are in regular need of guidance in their roles.

He emphasized that for the past year-and-a-half, the department and Town Hall were supposed to be transitioning between two different accounting software programs — from the old version NewWorld to the newer Munis. But rather than working on converting, the department was using both programs, logging different items in multiple places, sometimes more than once or, in some cases, potentially not logging them at all. Consequently, comparisons for accuracy have presented a time-consuming challenge.

“The conversion to Munis probably could have went a little bit smoother,” Centofanti said.

He said that the General Fund remains a confusing riddle in some ways, but noted he has made good progress reconciling some different separate department accounts.

“There are a lot of funds that are in good shape,” Centofanti said.

He said, however, “Until the General Fund is kind of closed, I don’t know which lines are overspent or underspent … I don’t know what the transfers are gonna be until, y’know, the end.”

Centofanti said that, as of that particular day, however — Nov. 3 — going forward, Town Hall would finally only use Munis for all its accounting. 

Under the Bus

Boucher, meanwhile, as she has done on many occasions over the past year, placed the onus of blame for Finance Department mishaps elsewhere, in particular on the functioning and, ironically, the high level of financial acumen of previous First Selectwoman Lynne Vanderslice, as well as on the former CFO Dawn Norton, and, for the first time, on the former Controller Tony DeFelice, who she had praised in the weeks after Norton’s sudden departure.

“I think in the past you had someone doing that budget … that was very facile with budgets and some of this may have not been apparent,” Boucher said, implying that because Vanderslice was a CPA, she was unaware of process problems in the Finance Department’s operations.

“Now that [she’s] no longer here and then we just had Dawn, then a lot of this did show up over time,” Boucher said, ignoring the possibility of any accountability relating to her own two-year tenure as the Town’s chief executive, as well as that of Town Administrator Matt Knickerbocker, who worked under her authority and was charged with overseeing the various departments.

“Also, we’re only half done, so there’s a lot we found in the controller’s office that needs to be fixed as well, so it’s not just the CFO but you’re also talking about the controller,” Boucher said.

“There was a lot that was not done properly by the former CFO that needs to be fixed … Again, these are individuals that preceded myself and others from a previous administration and unfortunately they failed in this mass conversion of Munis, which has led to the situation in which we’re in,” she said.

None of the Board of Selectmen members pushed back at Boucher’s statements.

While she said she strives to refrain from making comments about Boucher’s administration, Vanderslice shared a comment Monday night in an effort to correct what she said was a “significant misstatement.”

“Munis was implemented seven months after I left office,” Vanderslice said, “so the oversight of its implementation was the responsibility of my successor, as was the responsibility to ensure Munis employee processes were documented.”

Following the meeting GOOD Morning Wilton asked Boucher to comment about her repeated finger pointing at the past administration for Finance Department problems. GMW specifically asked if, after two years in office, is it her role to take full responsibility on decisions and events that have occurred under her management of the Town and its employees, specifically Norton and DeFelice?

“During my administration we have encountered numerous staffing problems at the highest level. We have been working diligently to correct all these issues and ensure that the very best people are hired by the town to provide the highest level of service,” Boucher responded. “That is my responsibility and a top goal of my administration.”

Boucher did not elaborate on which “high level” staffing problems she’s been working to correct. The Town has not hired any new senior staff since Boucher took office except for finding a replacement for DeFelice, and the search is still ongoing for a permanent CFO and new town administrator.

Reply for Help (Help Not Wanted)

As Centofanti referenced some of the still-missing information he needs in order to reconcile Wilton’s financial books, Healy — a certified public accountant who has now won election to the BOF — said she already has researched and compiled much of it.

“I have a lot of that information. I’d been hoping that I could connect with you to provide you with a lot of the adjusting entries that need to be made,” Healy said, explaining the need to “true up” the past budget numbers for Fiscal 2024 final entries.

“We actually still need to approve Fiscal 24 as well,” she said.

In response, however, Boucher interjected an indirect warning to Healy about engaging with staff members. 

“So, I may remind the board that in working with our staff and others, you should go through the First Selectman’s office,” Boucher said. “It is not the purview of this committee to run the departments of the town, but to work through the proper channel.”

Healy replied that she didn’t need to work with him, but said that all the information she had gathered had already been supplied to Boucher’s office.

“You have all the information,” Healy said, “so if you would like to provide it, it’s already been provided to this board … I’ve already done all the work through the budget process last year.”

One elected official whose assistance was accepted was Board of Finance Chair Matt Raimondi. Boucher has publicly acknowledged Raimondi’s work in trying to bring order to the Finance Department records to prepare the Town for the coming budget season. Ironically, Raimondi lost his bid for re-election on Tuesday.

Another Non Sequitur

Healy pointed out that, as far as the BOS was concerned, the budget for Fiscal 2024 has still not been closed, nor confirmed, noting that the lag impacted the budget process last year and would likely also have ramifications for the current year and the approaching budget process for FY ’27.

“When we started doing the budget last year, we didn’t have those numbers,” she said, “and so it makes it difficult to plan ahead if you don’t know how you ended the previous year.”

“We knew certain line items we had overspent, like legal, and we would have probably increased legal for Fiscal ’26 had we known that we went over in Fiscal ’24,” Healy explained, “but we didn’t do that process, and so I think we’re gonna probably be over again.”

In response, Boucher chose to go into a lengthy and seemingly irrelevant explanation of runaway legal costs.

“It’s quite obvious from our discussion on legal fees just why and how our legal fees have— Not only are they associated with [the] reval[uation], but there’s a host of individuals and also projects — at the Planning office, at the Police Department — and, quite frankly, individual board members that have asked a lot of legal questions that have taken a great deal of time,” Boucher said.

“There’s been a lot of contracts and leases that have come up that weren’t taken care of and that we’re working on that, so there’s no question that we’re going to have that very active discussion during the budget process for this coming year and that will be one important topic,” Boucher said.

Again, the others BOS members had no response to this.

But Are There Still Process Issues?

Hanging over the discussion is how the Town will look into the bigger picture of process issues, including the on-hold process review committee that was formed to identify an outside independent auditor to review Town Hall operations, beginning with the Finance Department and communications with Boucher and Knickerbocker.

Selectman Ross Tartell has aligned with Boucher in advocating that the town consider accepting PFK O’Connor Davies’ casual offer of taking on that audit role, instead of engaging another outside independent auditor.

Tartell asked Centofanti whether he thought a process review of Wilton’s Finance Department was now still even necessary.

Centofanti said it was, though he qualified it by saying it depended on what was meant by a process review.

“I guess the long answer is, you will probably need a detailed process review at the end … We’re trying to write some of this stuff down. There was nothing written down for any of us to follow,” he said.

“There still might be some areas that you need to look at,” Centofanti said, citing a lot of little things that need to be made uniform, need to be clarified and, in essence, codified within the department.

“It’s more documentation of a process … so somebody can step in and say this is how we do things,” he said.

Healy, who was elected to the BOS in 2021 and chose not to run again, shared a warning about vigilance with the board.

“We need to make sure this board is skilled enough to pick up on any inconsistencies or anything moving forward,” she said, “so that we don’t get into that same predicament in the future.”

“We should all look back and reflect on the signs that, maybe, were there that we missed,” Healy said, “and maybe we should have done a better job of identifying them.”