After reading in The Record that there was a possibility that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development may ask the city to reimburse it's CDBG account with $469,616 by the end of April, City Council President Clement Campana said Wednesday that he had decided to call a special meeting of the City Council to meet with Mayor Harry Tutunjian to discuss the matter next week after a regularly scheduled meeting of the council Finance Committee.

Upon learning about the meeting Campana had scheduled, Tutunjian issued a statement asking for the council to call a separate special meeting to discuss the proposed sale of the River Triangle and Dauchy buildings, which the council compelled the mayor to sign off on in September and is current the subject of litigation.

“Only the members of this City Council would show great concern for $475,000, and totally ignore $8 million,” Tutunjian said. “Their New Year’s resolution must have been to remain consistent, as they continue to govern by ‘gotcha politics’ while showing no regard for my administration and the difficult decisions we make each day.”

Campana said that while the issues did need to be discussed, Tutunjian had only called for the meeting because he had already scheduled one to discuss CDBG spending.

“The meeting is obviously just his reaction to the block grant issue,” said Campana. “There has been no decision on the River Triangle sale and he (Tutunjian) had a chance to veto the legislation and he didn’t. That’s a fact.”

The special meeting to discuss the city's CDBG issues will take place Jan. 22 at 7 p.m.
A time and date has not yet been set for the River Triangle meeting.

The city filed a federal lawsuit in U.S. District Court against the River Triangle Company on Nov. 24 demanding a judgment which would direct the company to comply with a "full and just independent accounting of all moneys received and disbursed" by the company over the last 20 years in relation to their ownership of the Dauchy and River Triangle buildings on River Street.

The lawsuit also called for the company to pay whatever sums appear to be owed to the city after the financial audit is completed.
Sections of the court document also noted that the company could owe up to $8.4 million to the city from a Urban Action Development Grant, a Section 108 loan from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and additional mortgage fees.

The document also specifically alleged that the RTC had not used its best efforts to lease space in the available buildings and denied leases for potential tenants in light of the fact that the city had agreed to pay loan payments to HUD if the company's cash flow was lower than their semi-annual payment amounts.

To date, the city has paid roughly $5 million for the majority of the RTC's payments through federal Community Development Block Grant funds.

Mark Simmons, a principal partner of the RTC, declined to comment on the matter because he said that had not yet seen the lawsuit and had no knowledge of its contents.