Key Points
- Birch and Escalante dispute how their comments were used to explain withholding the preliminary audit.
- Escalante describes a “full-on panic” during a call with Boucher about Healy’s audit inquiries.
- The audit remains unfinished as questions persist about its public posting and the Moody’s review.
Why It Matters: The conflicting accounts raise questions about who directed financial disclosure decisions and whether elected boards received the information needed to oversee town finances.
Two Board of Finance members made it clear on Tuesday, Sept. 29, that they believe their comments about the status of Wilton’s incomplete FY2025 financial information had been misrepresented by Wilton’s second selectman and CFO.
Those statements came as First Selectman Toni Boucher and CFO Dawn Savo have left questions unanswered about who knew about Moody’s review of Wilton’s bond ratings and why Board of Finance and Board of Selectmen members were not briefed about it nor provided with drafts of Wilton’s financial reports.
Specifically, BOF Chair Tim Birch and Vice Chair Rudy Escalante refuted what Savo wrote last week — that she had had discussions with the two men, whom she referred to as the “Board of Finance leadership,” and that all three had jointly agreed that the draft of the FY2025 financial report should not be distributed to either the BOF or BOS until it was complete.
Savo’s email, obtained by GOOD Morning Wilton, was sent before news broke about Moody’s review of Wilton’s ratings.
At the time Savo said the decision had been made to withhold the draft from the BOF and BOS, she had nevertheless already posted the preliminary audit document publicly on EMMA (Electronic Municipal Market Access), an internet database that serves as the municipal bond market’s disclosure system.
Birch, Escalante Dispute Savo’s Account and Tartell’s Remarks
“Each of us had individual conversations with Toni and/or Dawn about the preliminary audit,” Birch told the BOF. “They asked us not to review the preliminary audit because it had large sections of the audit missing, and was in their view, not complete enough for anybody to really review. And my response was, ‘I hear you. I’d prefer if you send us the preliminary audit when you think it is substantially done, so we can look at something that is, you know, mostly complete.'”
Instead, he said, the implication that either he or Escalante had sanctioned withholding the audit information from members of both boards until it was final was inaccurate.
“I sent each of them a message and said, ‘That’s not what I said. That’s a distortion of what I said,'” Birch said. “And I was actually a little angry about it because I don’t like it when people say things that I said that are not true. And so I just wanted to correct that, because from my perspective that was wholly inaccurate, and then it was recited at a Board of Selectmen meeting, which didn’t make me feel any happier.”
Birch was referring to the Sept. 22 BOS meeting when Second Selectman Ross Tartell said he’d been included on a Sept. 21 email with Birch, Boucher, Escalante and Savo about the EMMA audit posting. Tartell said he had asked for a link to the FY2025 draft on EMMA so it could be discussed at the Sept. 22 meeting, but Savo said she wasn’t going to distribute the draft based on discussions with Birch and Escalante.
Tartell voiced support of Savo’s handling of the situation, telling the BOS that she was following the direction of the BOF chair and vice chair.
Selectmen Matt Raimondi and David Tatkow objected and pointed out to Tartell, however, that the two didn’t have the power to make that decision on behalf of the full BOF without a board vote. Tartell replied that it was an issue for the BOF to take up, echoing what he said was Savo’s belief that the BOF had, in essence, asked to no longer receive reports that weren’t complete.
Escalante related a similar complaint, telling the BOF on Tuesday night that Tartell had grossly misinterpreted the intention of comments he’d made as well.
“In particular Ross, in a Board of Selectmen meeting, said that ‘the leadership,’ which I assume means me, requested that we get no more reports,” Escalante said, “and that really bordered on the absurd. I think he ought to retract that statement because that was a complete misquote of our intention.”
Escalante was referring to his own comments at a BOF’s audit subcommittee meeting on Sept. 24, when he reported a conversation with Savo in which he told her that, based on prior financial reports they had recently received containing inaccurate and incomplete information, he thought it would be better if her department took more time to ensure materials were complete and accurate before sharing them.
Audit Still Unfinished as Sept. 30 Target Nears
Meanwhile, the BOF remained in the dark on Tuesday as to exactly why the town had posted a preliminary version of the audit, specifically what had triggered it and who had authorized it.
“To be clear, I don’t think anybody on this board knew of the filing prior to the filing having been made,” Birch said, noting that BOF member Kim Healy had discovered it and alerted the rest of the board about it around Sept. 8.
“The explanation I have received … is that they had to do it for some purpose for Moody’s. It’s not clear to me where that came from and who said that. I have no information with respect to that,” Birch said, including how that was communicated to Town officials and whether the town’s bond advisor was involved.
The long-overdue audit, which Savo had targeted for completion by Sept. 30, remained unfinished as of Tuesday’s meeting. Birch said Savo was unavailable to sign it. [Editor’s note: GOOD Morning Wilton received an automated response to an email sent to Savo that stated she was out of the office as of Monday, Sept. 28, and returning on Monday, Oct. 5.] The audit cannot be finished without Savo’s signature.
Earlier in the day Birch said he had spoken with Wilton’s auditor Leslie Zoll, principal at CliftonLarsonAllen LLP, who told him three items were still outstanding: a transmittal letter, updated letters from attorneys on material litigation, and the Management Discussion and Analysis narrative (MD&A). He said he believed Zoll, who was unavailable for the BOF’s Tuesday meeting, would attend the BOF’s regular meeting in October.
“I think the best case is that it’s filed at the beginning of next week,” Birch said of the final audit. “That’s the best case.”
Escalante Describes ‘Full-On Panic’ Call From Boucher and Savo
Escalante also described a somewhat dramatic-sounding phone call he received last week from Town Hall.
“In full disclosure, I did receive a phone call from Toni and Dawn last Wednesday afternoon, and the call was about an email that Kim had sent,” Escalante recounted. “And Toni implied that the entire financial structure of Wilton was at risk because of this email.”
He described a confusing back-and-forth with Boucher, in which he struggled to find out specifically which email she was referencing and what its content had been. Escalante said she also asked him “[for] something to do about Kim” Healy’s inquiries, though it wasn’t entirely clear what she meant.
“Once I realized that the information was going to continue to be vague, I told Toni that I didn’t have any idea what she was talking about, and I can’t tell Kim what to do anyhow,” Escalante said.
“But clearly, there was a full-on panic going on between (Toni) and Dawn,” he said.
He said he later found the email from Healy — one inquiring about when she could offer comments and edits for the audit document — but Escalante said he was unclear why it had caused such concern.
“It was a pretty innocuous email, a pretty benign email, about ‘When can I offer comments,’ [but] there clearly was a panic going on,” he said.
Former First Selectwoman Lynne Vanderslice spoke during public comment, emphasizing the gravity of the matter with regard to Moody’s and Wilton maintaining its Aaa rating.
Citing Moody’s June 30 and Sept. 25 press releases, she noted that Wilton’s ratings had been put under review in June and then reconfirmed after the agency received additional financial information. She also pointed to the warning that issuers providing unaudited statements could be placed under review again if they did not provide finalized audits within the next two to three months, depending on their fiscal year-end dates.
Vanderslice described how Oxford lost its rating last year after missing the deadline to provide information in time to Moody’s, and then had it reinstated after submitting the information.
She said the next review by Moody’s was scheduled for December.
“If someone does miss the next one, then they are subject to losing their rating,” she said.
