Connecticut Post
Auditors begin probe of Rell’s use of taxpayer-funded study
By Ken Dixon STAFF WRITER
Updated: 10/08/2009
HARTFORD -- State auditors on
Thursday began investigating the role
a University of Connecticut professor
played in running a focus group and
advising Gov. M. Jodi Rell on political
positions that she later took, including a
tough stance this year against new taxes.
Robert G. Jaekle, of Stratford, one of
Connecticut’s two auditors of public
accounts, said that Thursday reports in
The Day newspaper of New London on
Professor Kenneth Dautrich’s role in Rell’s
political strategy prompted the probe.
“I’ve learned about this from a newspaper
article,” Jaekle said in an interview.
“That’s all I know. I anticipated concerns
raised by people. I don’t know what the
facts are. We’ve started reviewing this
matter.”
Rell’s budget office contracted Dautrich,
a professor of public policy, for more
than $220,000 to conduct a two-and-
one-half-year study of ways to make
state government more efficient. But the
newspaper quoted Dautrich, a former
long-time UConn pollster, as admitting
that he advised Rell on potentially
popular positions with state voters.
The advice Dautrich exchanged with Rell
and M. Lisa Moody, the governor’s chief
of staff, had potential value of thousands
of dollars, though Rell didn’t claim it
in her state campaign-finance filings.
Connecticut law also prohibits state
employees from using state resources for
political purposes.
Dautrich, in an interview Thursday
evening, said the project, which is about
halfway through and has spent $100,000,
has created “important” research for the
state and has already resulted in millions
of dollars in savings.
He said that one of 200 recommendations
was for the state program to divert
unclaimed bottle deposits that for 30 years
reverted to beer and soda distributors.
Another was to reduce the state motor
fleet by 1,000 vehicles. Both programs
were adopted.
Rell, in a statement Thursday afternoon
from her Capitol office, said Dautrich’s
duties for the state Office of Policy and
Management were confined to preparing
a two-year budget proposal.
“I am very pleased with the work that
Ken Dautrich did to define issues for
reducing state spending, working with
agency commissioners to identify areas
where savings could be achieved, and
providing insight and new ideas as we
struggled -- and continue to struggle --
with the most difficult budget situation in
modern memory,” Rell said. “We worked
very hard to ensure that the work he did
and the questions he asked were policy-
based, dealing with budget, spending and
taxing issues.”
The Day reported Thursday, first in its
print edition and later on its Web site, that
Dautrich ran a focus group that reviewed
the governor’s budget and policy outlines.
“I don’t think opinion should drive
decisions, but at a minimum should be
taken into account and the governor
should take the lead in shaping it,”
Dautrich wrote in an e-mail to Moody
in June 2008 that was among dozens
reviewed by the newspaper. “A set of polls
can be very useful in this regard.”
Another Rell staff member, in an e-mail
exchange with Dautrich, speculated
on the relative popularity of Attorney
General Richard Blumenthal, a potential
Democratic challenger against the
Republican governor.
“It’s important work,” Dautrich said,
adding that the focus group cost $2,200
of the $100,000 spent interviewing state
commissioners and others involved in
public policy.
But Democrats immediately charged Rell
with using state resources for political
purposes.
Speaker of the House Christopher
G. Donovan, D-Meriden, and Senate
Majority Leader Martin M. Looney, D-
New Haven, said in an afternoon news
conference in the Capitol complex they
were “disappointed” and “extremely
concerned and disturbed” by the
governor’s apparent tactic.
“We’ve been trying to put a budget
together and we’ve been looking for a
partnership with the governor to try to
deal with our severe economic downturn,
and what we find difficult to swallow is
that while we’re doing this and trying to
figure out what’s best for the state the
governor is employing a consultant to
give her political advice on how to make
decisions based on political advantage
over the budget,” Donovan.
Donovan said that officials have to find
out how much of the taxpayer-funded
$220,000 grant was diverted for political
purposes. “It seems that at least these
documents associated with the study
should be accounted for and shared with
the state of Connecticut,” Donovan said.
“Why were there questions asked about
Attorney General Blumenthal in this,
because he’s not someone who has a
specific role in the budget process?”
Looney said. “That really does put it more
in the context of an electoral campaign
kind of poll.”