By Gretchen Webster

WESTPORT — The last two open seats on the new Civilian Public Safety Departments Review Board have been filled, ending a process that started three years ago. 

The newest members of the board — established by ordinance to independently review citizen complaints about police, fire and emergency medical service personnel — are Jay Dirnberger and Mark Rubino. 

Named to the board by First Selectwoman Jennifer Tooker, the men’s appointment was publicly confirmed Thursday — the day their terms began — only after inquiries by Westport Journal.

Dirnberger is a retired investment portfolio manager and registered Republican. He is a decorated Vietnam War veteran who often speaks to area groups about his military experiences as a helicopter pilot.

Rubino, a Democrat, is a corporate attorney for KPMG. Among his community activities is membership on the Parish Council at Church of the Assumption.

“They both have terrific professional and volunteer backgrounds to add value,” said Selectwoman Andrea Moore, who interviews many of the citizens who apply to serve on town boards and commissions.

The five-member review board was established by an ordinance approved by the Representative Town Meeting in November 2023. The independent board’s creation was the culmination of several years of often-heated debate — and rejection of several proposals — to replace the Civilian Review Panel, which was established in 2020 by then-First Selectman Jim Marpe. That panel, however, served entirely at the pleasure of the first selectperson, and two of its five members were the other members of the Board of Selectmen.

The other members of the new board are Teresa Fabi, a former New York prosecutor, and Michael Guthman, a former RTM member, appointed by the Representative Town Meeting, and Harold Bailey, Jr., longtime chairman of TEAM Westport, the town’s multi-cultural advocacy committee, who was elected by TEAM’s board of directors. Bailey, Fabi and Guthman also had been members of the now-defunct panel, as well as Selectwomen Andrea Moore and Candice Savin. The selectwomen’s role was eliminated under the new board’s format because some felt it posed a potential conflict of interest.

Dirnberger and Rubino will take the seats previously held by Moore and Savin. An alternate member of the board “will be filled in the near future, before training [of the new board members] that is scheduled for September,” said Moore, who interviewed candidates for the board seats filled by Tooker.

The impetus to create a town body to review citizen complaints about emergency services personnel was triggered by an 2018 incident when Westport resident Jason Stiber was cited for distracted driving while talking on a cell phone. He claimed he was eating hash-brown potatoes and not talking on his phone, and ultimately prevailed over police in court. Stiber, who argued he had been unfairly issued an infraction, was a petitioner for an early version of the review board, which was soundly rejected by the RTM in October 2021.

But efforts to create an independent review board continued, and after more debate and revisions, RTM committees fashioned an ordinance last October that ultimately won approval from the full legislative body.

Other town boards, commissions await new members

The Civilian Public Safety Departments Review Board isn’t the only new board put on hold waiting for officials to appoint members.

That time-consuming process, Moore said, includes interviewing candidates and assessing their qualifications for a particular board. She does much of the interviewing for vacancies on town boards and commissions.

Candidates are still under review for appointment to a new Fair Rent Commission, established by the RTM in July 2023, and the Affordable Housing Trust Fund Committee, established to administer money raised to promote affordable housing initiatives through an inclusionary zoning fee adopted last February.

So far, Moore said, three people have been interviewed for appointment to the five-member rent panel, and another is scheduled to be interviewed soon.

“We didn’t want to announce them one at a time, we want to announce them together,” she said. “We’re getting close — by the end of the summer they should be complete and we’ll be ready to announce who they are.”

Tooker has approved five residents for membership on the Affordable Housing Trust Fund Committee, according to Moore, but they must also be approved by the Representative Town Meeting. They have not been publicly named.

Those appointees “should be approved at the September meeting of the RTM.” Moore said. Members of the affordable housing group do not need to be interviewed by the RTM because they are the first selectwomen’s appointees, she said.

Vacancies on several other town boards have been filled in recent months, Moore added, including the recent appointment of Michele Carey-Moody to the Conservation Commission.

“I keep a spreadsheet. We have appointed close to 100 people” over the three years of the current selectwomen’s terms, Moore said.

“It’s a lot of work, but the people are the best part,” she added.

Freelance writer Gretchen Webster, a Fairfield County journalist for many years, was editor of the Fairfield Minuteman and has taught journalism at New York and Southern Connecticut State universities.