Martin Hosts Mayoral Forum Focused On Government Transparency

Stamford mayoral candidate and Board of Finance member David Martin hosted a forum Wednesday evening at the Chester Addison Community Center in which he called for a more transparent city government.

Martin, who has the backing of Stamford's own Democratic City Committee but not Gov. Dannel Malloy, who earlier this week endorsed Democrat opponent Rep. William Tong, mostly read a statement to a packed room at the center before fielding audience and reporter questions as part of a push to make himself accessible to the various communities around Stamford.

On his list of topics, he addressed how closed from the public he feels the current administration to be and said he has a detailed plan for opening up the inner working of Stamford's government, to both the public and the city's employees. He used the revaluation process that left some Stamford residents with sticker shock after receiving their tax bills this year as a jumping off point for how communication is key between the city and citizens.

"We must do more to ensure that residents are no longer in the dark when it comes to actions taken by our city government that affect their lives," Martin said. "The revaluation process is just one example where every public official, from the mayor on down, needs to think and act differently moving forward, putting Stamford and its residents first."

Martin said it was time for an open government and an honest government, making things like access to information easier. He called Stamford's current website —dubbed the "Virtual Town Center" —"deplorable" and said he'd like to redesign the site to make it easier to navigate. Martin called for hosting on the site of videos from every public meeting city officials hold, not just the limited number of big ticket meetings hosted there now, like the Board of Representatives. This way those who can't make it to the center can still keep up to date with what's going on, he said.

Martin also said he'd like to reinitiate Mayor's Night Out, host virtual town hall meetings, post all public documents online and garner more input from residents on the city's budget.

"We need a mayor who's going to lead an open and transparent government," he said. "He can not hide out in secret meetings on the 10th floor of the government center. He needs to be proactive, not just reactive. He must be in constant dialogue with the community and take proactive steps to eliminate secrecy and solicit open dialogue. He can never, ever stop listening to the citizens of Stamford because they come first."

Martin said he'd be ready to start opening up Stamford's inner-workings on day one and said he looked forward to working closely with those around him to both listen and promote transparency. Martin said he wanted to make it easier for city employees to report those who were not abiding by the strictest of morals.

Particularly, Martin said he'd explain in his first week to all department heads in the city that all procedures that violate honest and ethical conduct would end immediately and each head would be responsible and held accountable for initiating controls that would end things like nepotism and prevent employees from participating in questionable behavior, Martin said. He'd even set up a direct line for employees to contact him if they feel pressured to act in an unethical way, Martin said.

"The mayor must have a continuous pulse on city operations," he said. "In the past few years, we've had too many criminal and ethical issues in the city of Stamford. I want Stamford to be a model city government. One that is honest and open and one that we can all be proud of because the ethical and criminal lapses in city government erode our residents' confidence in city hall, hurt our tax payers and damage the reputation of the honest and hard-working city employees and hurts the reputation of Stamford. And I say Stamford deserves better."