New Haven Independent

The latest example: Daniels’ appearance before 250 people at a packed public meeting in Dixwell’s Elks Club hall Tuesday night over the police department’s theft and bribery scandal.

More than any other speaker in a decidedly anti-DeStefano crowd, Daniels laid the scandal at the mayor’s feet — along with just about everything else that’s gone wrong in New Haven short of a Texas town’s challenge to Louis’ Lunch’s claim of inventing the hamburger.

The Daniels-DeStefano rivalry goes back almost two decades. The two ran against each other for mayor in 1989. It was a bitter campaign; Daniels won and served two terms. DeStefano then became mayor after Daniels retired in 1993, and has served ever since. The two have never patched up their rivalry. Daniels is close to former Alderman Jim Newton, who has filed papers to challenge DeStefano for mayor this year.

Daniels’ signal achievement, when he was mayor, was bringing community policing to New Haven. Under Daniels, and then DeStefano, the department was transformed from a sometimes-brutal, racist and sexist police force presiding over one of the country’s highest per-capita murder rates, to one of the country’s most admired community-connected and innovative forces presiding over, until recently, the lowest rates of New Haven violent crime since the days of President Lyndon Johnson.

Community policing started slipping before this scandal. At Tuesday night’s hearing, Daniels blamed DeStefano for “politicizing” the department, thus leading to that decline.

“The police department can do whatever it wants” because cops know the mayor will kowtow to the police union, which backed his run for governor, Daniels charged. He charged that DeStefano was responsible for Chief Ortiz’s decision two years ago to rescind a transfer of Lt. Billy White, the central figure in the current scandal, from his post overseeing the narcotics unit. Both Ortiz and DeStefano have denied that charge, although they say they did discuss the situation between the time Ortiz decided to transfer, then un-transfer, White.

Buoyed by whoops of approval from the crowd, Daniels, raising his voice, continued the attack. He blamed DeStefano for politicizing the schools. For attacking NAACP President Scot X. Esdaile in order to deflect criticism over the police scandal. Even for the closure of the Dixwell Q House.

Click on the play arrow above for a sampling of Daniels ripping into DeStefano.

DeStefano did not return a call for comment Tuesday night.

While the crowd generally applauded Daniels’ comments, an historical inconsistency did emerge.

One of the event’s organizers, Michael Jefferson, asked Daniels if, as mayor, he had known about accusations of past misconduct against Lt. White.

Yes he did, Daniels responded. However, Daniels said, White was never promoted while Daniels was mayor.

Not true. As another speaker, activist George Edwards, pointed out later in the evening, White was in fact promoted to head of intelligence while Daniels was mayor. White received widespread praise in some quarters for his work during that time gathering intelligence that led to arrests, and convictions, of leaders of several drug gangs in town.

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