ANSONIA - Mayor Frank Tyszka March 10 appointed ten city residents to review and potentially propose changes to the city's charter, after saying he'd like to see the city's budget process revised.
The charter revision commission is tasked with evaluating the city's charter, holding public hearings to gather input from residents, and proposing changes they deem necessary.
The charter is the blueprint for city government. It dictates everything from the mayor's powers to the city's budget process to the length of elected terms.
Any charter changes would need to be approved by voters at a referendum before they could become law.
The members of the commission (and their party affiliations) are:
The first step in the process is to hold a public hearing. The commission would also be required to create a draft report on its proposed amendments and hold a public hearing on that report before sending the amendments to referendum.
The board includes six Democrats, two Republicans, and two members unaffiliated with either party.
Pergola - one of the unaffiliated members - is currently president of the city's Board of Aldermen and ran for office on the Democratic ticket in November.
Elizabeth Lynch is the town and city clerk. Daniel Kershaw is the city's tree warden.
Javier Varas is a previous chairman of the city's Democratic Party and was Tyszka's campaign manager in 2025.
Tyszka Wants Budget Process Revised
The charter revision commission - not the mayor - decides whether to send charter revision proposals to voters.
However, Tyszka has said in past statements that he'd like the commission to consider reversing a series of budget reforms passed in a charter revision twelve years ago.
In 2014, voters approved a series of budget reforms to the charter which were championed by former Mayor David Cassetti's administration.
Those reforms gave the final say over the city's budget to the city's elected Board of Aldermen. Previously, the Board of Apportionment or Taxation (or tax board), whose members are appointed by the mayor, had that control.
The 2014 reforms also required the Board of Aldermen to send the budget to voters if its 'net taxes to be collected' - the total amount of money the city expects to collect in taxes - increases by more than 3 percent.
Members of Cassetti's administration said that the reforms gave taxpayers greater say over the city's finances and required elected officials to be more accountable to the people.
However, in public statements since being elected, Tyszka said the charter changes have ended up hurting the city's finances. He's said control over the city budget should return to the tax board, since its members are appointed specifically to review the city's budget.
Tyszka has argued the tax board is better equipped to scrutinize budget requests than the Board of Aldermen, since the Aldermen have a more wide-ranging set of responsibilities.
"I'm going to go back to the old way, and if we have to do a charter revision to make sure that we have people looking at the budget, that's what I'm going to ask the charter revision people to do," Tyszka said at an Aldermen meeting Feb. 10.
Next Steps
The commission will need to schedule a public hearing before it can begin work in earnest. An organizational meeting has been scheduled for March 26.
At that meeting, the commission could schedule its first public hearing for a later date.
After that public hearing, the commission would hold a series of public meetings to discuss its proposals before compiling them into a draft report. It could also schedule more public hearings.
That draft report would be subject to another public hearing before the commission could vote to finalize their recommendations.
Those recommendations would then go to the ballot, where voters would have the final say.
State law includes deadlines for getting charter revision questions on the ballot. If the commission decides it wants to get the questions on the November 2026 ballot, it would need to finalize and submit its recommendations by September.