Key Points
- Selectmen questioned why the audit and other outstanding town business were missing from the meeting’s original agenda.
- Healy challenged the administration’s oversight as officials reviewed unfinished financial reporting work.
- Savo’s Dec. 3 departure raises questions about staffing, audit corrections and responsibility for the transition.
Why It Matters: Completing the overdue audit leaves Wilton with financial reporting problems to resolve and a leadership transition that will determine who carries that work forward.
Wilton’s Chief Financial Officer Dawn Savo was not in attendance for Monday’s Board of Selectmen meeting on Nov. 2 because she was participating in a Hamden, CT Legislative Council meeting, where members unanimously approved her appointment as that town’s finance director.
Savo has since formally notified Wilton officials of her departure. Her last day will be Thursday, Dec. 3.
In her absence Monday, a summary of the newly completed audit for Fiscal Year 2025, including multiple issues that will need to be addressed by Wilton’s Finance Department to correct processes, was provided by Board of Finance member Kim Healy, who chairs the BOF’s Audit Remediation and Financial Reporting Subcommittee.
Healy, who offered the BOS an impromptu assessment of the audit at the board’s invitation, made it clear she felt that First Selectman Toni Boucher‘s oversight of Savo and the Finance Department was at the heart of the town’s ongoing financial reporting difficulties.
“You should have known this was going sideways, full stop,” Healy said. “Sorry, I know that sounds really harsh to say, but it is 100% the truth.”
Her remarks followed an earlier disagreement over why the audit and other outstanding town business had not been included on the meeting’s original agenda.
Raimondi: “Disappointed, Problematic and Lack of Transparency”
Following GOOD Morning Wilton‘s reporting on Thursday, Oct. 29 about Savo’s engagement with Hamden, Savo emailed BOF and BOS members Friday morning acknowledging that she was pursuing the finance director position in that town and would provide formal notice once Hamden officials had voted on her hiring.
GOOD Morning Wilton obtained an email Selectman Matt Raimondi sent to Boucher and the other selectmen on Friday, Oct. 30 asking for an agenda item to be added to Monday’s BOS meeting about the Finance Department “to discuss next steps, both in terms of the CFO search and the work that needs to be addressed in the interim.”
“My primary concern is that we have a significant amount of work ahead of us over the next several months, at a time when the Finance Department is already facing substantial staffing constraints. I think it is important that we establish a clear plan for managing these responsibilities while conducting what could be a challenging search for a permanent CFO,” Raimondi wrote.
Boucher responded that she planned to hold a special meeting for the discussion on Friday, Nov. 6 — following Hamden’s planned vote also on Monday night.
Raimondi wrote back to ask Boucher why the BOS would need to wait until Friday.
“The news is already public — officials in Hamden have posted about it on social media, it has been reported in the press, and Dawn notified us earlier today. Given that, I’m not sure what would prevent us from including this on Monday’s agenda.”
Despite other officials reportedly weighing in to support Raimondi, Boucher continued to insist the discussion couldn’t take place until after Monday.
But at the beginning of Monday’s meeting, Boucher did propose adding a discussion of the CFO’s status. Raimondi agreed and then separately proposed adding a discussion of several other outstanding agenda items he said deserved attention.
“I was candidly a bit surprised by how light this agenda was, just in light of all the different things going on. That’s with the CFO, which we added. There’s the audit. There’s an update on the head of DPW [Department of Public Works]. There’s Gilbert and Bennett. There’s all the different committees, and so I wanted to create a new motion to discuss future agenda items,” Raimondi said.
Boucher said some items had been deferred to allow all five selectmen to participate. Second Selectman Ross Tartell was absent Monday.
Raimondi argued that the BOS should review the audit that evening, even without Savo there.
Raimondi suggested inviting members of the BOF’s audit subcommittee who were in attendance. When Selectman Rich McCarty noted that the subcommittee was overseen by the BOF rather than the BOS, Raimondi responded that the corrective actions involved town departments overseen by the selectmen.
“I just want to understand what exactly the deficiencies are and what exactly our department is doing to resolve it,” he said.
McCarty agreed that the BOS should discuss the corrective action plan with the CFO and receive regular progress updates.
Raimondi said the board should begin that discussion immediately.
“We’re a week after we got the audit. There is a very real concern in town about a lack of transparency at this board,” he said.
Boucher disputed the suggestion that information was being withheld, noting that board members had received the audit and that the BOF’s subcommittee had discussed it.
“It’s not like anybody’s holding any information back,” she said, and said the audit would be placed on the Nov. 16 agenda, when Savo would be available to report.
“The 16th is two weeks from now,” Raimondi said. “We got the audit a week ago,” he said, arguing for an update. “It should be Dawn,” Raimondi said. “She’s still employed by us. We are still paying her. She should be here right now.”
Raimondi and Boucher disagreed several times during the exchange, and Raimondi asked her to stop interrupting him.
“Please stop interrupting me. Please stop interrupting. I’m speaking,” he said.
“I’d like to be on the record as saying I’m very disappointed that we are a week after the audit, which is 16 months after the fiscal year ended [and there are] all these different issues in the audit. I’d like to discuss those too,” he said, “and we have a regularly scheduled Board of Selectmen meeting and we’re not here discussing it. I find that very problematic.”
The board ultimately agreed to add the audit discussion and invite Healy to speak.
Healy Questions Oversight and Consultant’s Work
Healy emphasized that completing the FY2025 audit did not mean the Finance Department’s remaining work would be straightforward.
“There’s still a tremendous amount of work,” she said, including work on the FY2026 books.
She described unreconciled accounts, problems with capital asset records and the need for formal procedures to close the books and meet grant reporting requirements. The audit subcommittee, she said, would regularly check whether corrective actions were being implemented.
Healy also praised Savo’s participation in the subcommittee’s Oct. 27 meeting, calling it “probably the most productive meeting I’ve had all year.”
“She was extremely informative,” Healy said, adding that Savo had provided information the subcommittee had not previously heard.
While Boucher has continued to attribute problems to former CFO Dawn Norton and the troubled MUNIS accounting software implementation, Healy said Boucher did not adequately manage either Norton or former Town Administrator Matt Knickerbocker, nor has she successfully managed the work of Savo or the accounting consultant Joseph Centofanti, both of whom were charged with overseeing the completion of the audit.
Healy said Boucher and the BOS should have recognized the difficulties and intervened earlier.
“You’re not gonna like what I’m going to say, Toni, but the Board of Selectmen, yourself, you are her boss,” Healy said of Savo. “You were Dawn Norton’s boss and Matt Knickerbocker was her boss.”
“You should have known that this was going sideways. Full stop.”
Healy said earlier intervention could have helped ensure Norton had the resources needed for the software transition.
“Had the board known she was having problems? Had anyone checked in with her? This wouldn’t have happened because the Board of Selectmen would have taken initiatives much earlier to make sure that she had the resources she needed,” Healy said.
As she has done in the past, Boucher said Norton did not provide her or Knickerbocker with “the proper information… until it was too late,” noting that Norton was on a 12-week family medical leave before her departure in August of 2025.
Boucher said Norton requested outside assistance after the implementation was already underway and that staff had not been adequately trained to use the system.
Norton, in fact, was living remotely in Wyoming for many months and had taken a full-time job there during that time, continuing her role as Wilton’s CFO virtually for months.
Boucher also defended Centofanti’s company, PKF O’Connor Davies, saying it had repeatedly discovered accounting problems that required records to be corrected.
However, town officials have expressed ongoing concern about Centofanti’s work for what has been approximately a $250,000 cost to the town over the past year.
Selectman David Tatkow questioned why the board had continued to receive expectations that the audit would soon be finished as the work stretched from winter into fall.
“I personally felt strung along,” Tatkow said of reassurances from Boucher and Savo that audit work was progressing smoothly and would soon be finished. Completing the audit took about eight months more than originally had been anticipated. “I don’t know where exactly that chain broke down.”
Healy said the communication problems reflected a failure by those supervising Centofanti, specifying that Savo was not supervising the firm during the period she was discussing.
Healy noted that the BOS and BOF had tried to obtain explanations from Centofanti but had limited opportunities to question him directly, and that Boucher and Savo did not require Centofanti to appear before either the BOF or BOS to provide updates or answer any questions.
“We never got to meet. He was stopped from coming in,” she said.
Boucher again said the firm had encountered more work than expected and that elected officials contributed to a reluctance to appear before the boards.
“I’m going to repeat myself again … It became increasingly difficult to come before our boards because they made the presentations difficult,” she said.
Raimondi rejected that explanation. “That’s not a reason not to speak to us. We are entitled to ask questions.”
He then asked whether the consultant’s work had contributed to mistakes reflected in the audit findings.
Healy recalled that at the start of his work for Wilton, Centofanti had said the town’s books would be ready for audit without a material weakness finding and in a more timely fashion.
“That did not happen, as we know,” she said.
McCarty noted that some audit recommendations dated back to 2021.
“Prior years, prior Boards of Selectmen,” he said.
Healy, however, pointed out that FY2022 had no findings of any problems and FY2023 showed only one significant deficiency related to federal American Rescue Plan Act funding.
“So the minute you have none, you reset,” she said. “The problems started in Fiscal 24.”
Questions About the Transition After Savo Departs
During Monday’s discussion of Savo’s departure, Boucher said the town would consider an interim CFO and a search for a permanent replacement.
Raimondi urged the town to find an interim CFO who could overlap with Savo before she leaves and work in the office five days a week. He cited unfinished FY2025 work, FY2026 accounting and upcoming budget preparation.
Tatkow said selectmen should have an opportunity to interview the interim candidate to avoid repeating their experience with the previous consultant.
The board also debated the composition of a search committee and its role in selecting the next CFO. Boucher described recruitment as an administrative responsibility, while Raimondi argued that the BOS’s hiring authority under the town charter meant the board should determine the search committee’s composition.
Boucher said she would seek further legal guidance for the discussion.
Errors in Filed Report and Questions About the Transition
Earlier in Monday’s meeting, Raimondi had cited a resident’s email to Savo and both the BOF and BOS pointing out what he said were multiple errors in the FY2025 financial report that the town had filed and town officials proclaimed ‘completed.’
The email came from Resident Joshua Kopac, who has examined the town’s financial reporting through public records requests and reviews of its EMMA bond disclosure filings and state enforcement records concerning the overdue audit.
His four-page email on the FY2025 audit report identified errors and inconsistencies and requested a corrected filing and answers about who would oversee corrections and the town’s corrective action plan after Savo leaves.
His email stated that the errors did not change a financial statement total or the auditors’ opinion. His concern, he said, was the review process and whether the town would correct the filed report.
McCarty said the CFO had responded that day. Boucher agreed, saying she had answered “point by point.”
Speaking during public comment later that evening, Kopac said he had not received Savo’s response to his letter and asked that it be sent to him.
He subsequently told GMW Savo’s response had been sent to the two boards and was only forwarded to him later, after the meeting.
In her written response to the boards, Savo acknowledged errors in a financial statement note, narrative figures and statistical tables, and said some carried forward from the prior year’s report. She said the narrative, statistical and editorial errors did not appear materially significant and was consulting with the auditor about the incorrect note.
“My preliminary assessment is that these items are unlikely to require reissuance, subject to their review,” Savo wrote.
She added that corrections could be described in the official statement for an upcoming bond sale if the bond advisor and bond counsel deemed disclosure necessary.
While Savo’s email addressed the identified errors, Kopac said it did not answer his seven questions about the review process, a corrected filing and responsibility for the remaining work.
Kopac also questioned who would carry out the corrective action plan after Savo leaves.
“Who owns that plan the day after she leaves? Who’s running finance in December?” he asked.
