McCaw Edict on Port Authority: This Progress Is Not DECD’s. It Is OPM’s.

What a difference a federal criminal investigation makes. In November 2019, then-Office of Policy and Management Secretary Melissa McCaw was in a twist over the grim state of the Connecticut Port Authority. A CT Mirror story by Keith Phaneuf highlighting more embarrassing revelations included in a report from state auditors had caught McCaw’s attention.

McCaw told the agency’s spokesperson, Chris McClure, that she needed the durable Democrat to “take the lead on crafting OPM’s comm plan to highlight our extensive and outstanding work, including timing of release, etc. Currently the administration is silent and all these audit issues and I want to get in front of it and be clear that we’ve taken the lead and we are restoring the financial integrity and related and confidence back into this organization…This progress is not DECD’s. It is OPM.”

McCaw subordinate Jeffrey Beckham replied that he and colleague Robert Dakers would be delivering the budget agency’s testimony at a December 4th legislative hearing on the audit. “Draft it,” McCaw replied, “I might present it depending on workload although I believe I’m scheduled to be out.” McCaw did big foot Beckham and Dakers at the daylong hearing, presenting testimony alongside Paul Mounds, Governor Ned Lamont’s chief of staff, and David Kooris, who was serving as acting chair of the authority as well as deputy commissioner of DECD.

In the aftermath of the port authority scandals, McCaw’s deputy and close friend, Kostantinos Diamantis, was given extraordinary dominion over the State Pier project at the New London port. The decision by Lamont to entrust Diamantis with extensive power baffled observers at the time. Federal criminal investigators appear to be focused on the former Democratic state representative’s role in the creation of a $235 million wind turbine hub.

The emails were included in the Lamont administration’s compliance with a federal subpoena seeking documents related to the probe. Nobody is in the hunt for credit now. McCaw and Diamantis have left OPM. Beckham has succeeded McCaw. Lamont continues to be notably incurious about who knew what at OPM.

The federal criminal investigation, which Lamont said he learned of “in passing” from his corruption-busting legal counsel, continues.

Published April 29, 2022.