Jamestown City Council members could vote at the end of the month to ask the state Comptroller’s Office to investigate a retired City Court Judge’s receipt of retiree benefits.

A resolution is included in the agenda for Monday’s City Council work session. The council could vote on the resolution at its August 26 voting session. City officials are also asking for the council’s approval to hire outside legal counsel to recover $1,576.70 in dental benefits provided.

City officials say Fred Larson, a former City Council member, retired Jamestown City Court Judge and current Chautauqua County legislator, enrolled in the city’s employee retirement dental benefits program after his retirement from City Court. Judges are employed by New York state, and city officials say Larson was not eligible to enroll in the program for Jamestown retirees.

“As the city mayor, I have an ethical and legal obligation to protect the City taxpayers including fighting fraud and corruption. When reviewing insurance concerns and working on related policies I discovered that Fred Larson, a retired state employee, was participating in the taxpayer-funded city employee retiree dental program and I immediately requested an internal investigation. That investigation confirmed that Mr. Larson was not eligible for city retiree dental benefits, and that the city taxpayers had paid several thousand dollars in dental costs on behalf of Mr. Larson and his wife.”

Outside legal counsel will be necessary because Elliot Raimondo, city corporation counsel, was involved in drafting the contract between the city and Larson – a fact Larson mentioned in a statement to The Post-Journal in response to the resolution.

“First, who wrote this defamatory resolution? It could not have been the city’s Corporation Counsel since he was the Corporation Counsel who prepared the Agreement for retiree dental insurance. I signed the Agreement exactly as prepared by the Corporation Counsel. If there were to be litigation over dental insurance, the city’s Corporation Counsel would have to be a witness for me,” Larson said. ” City Hall is throwing their own Corporation Counsel under the bus. When I took the job as City Court Judge I understood at my retirement I would be eligible for certain benefits as my predecessor had received when he retired. After a lifetime of service to this city, I am saddened and shocked at being defamed by the current city administration. There appears to be a hidden agenda here.”

City officials say the issue was found in the wake of a city policy change approved by the City Council earlier this year that allowed city officials to charge a late fee for late health and dental insurance payments. A late payment prompted a question how Larson was eligible for city insurance since he hadn’t technically been a city employee.

Coverage was canceled on March 1, 2022, according to the resolution, before Larson signed a confidential agreement with former Mayor Eddie Sundquist allowing Larson and his wife to rejoin the city retiree dental insurance program. The agreement didn’t come up for approval by City Council members.

“This confidential agreement expressly acknowledged that ‘the city erroneously allowed Judge Larson to obtain city dental insurance at the time of his separation from the Jamestown City Court as a judge,'” the resolution states.

City officials say the confidential agreement was not approved by the City Council and violates the state’s General City Law by granting extra compensation to a public officer, servant or contractor and also violates the state Constitution’s prohibition against making a gift of any money to any individual.

The resolution states the city has tried to recoup the money but not been able to do so, prompting the resolution on Monday’s council agenda.

“Mr. Larson paid the city less than 25% of the cost of his dental care, with the city taxpayers paying the balance,” Ecklund said. “The internal investigation also revealed that after Mr. Larson was kicked out of the retiree dental program in March 2022 because he was not a city retiree, he was reinstated a few weeks later pursuant to a non-disclosure agreement he signed with prior Mayor Sundquist. I have been advised that this agreement violates both the General City Law and the New York State Constitution and is null and void. Despite multiple requests to pay restitution to the City of Jamestown, Mr. Larson instead blames the prior administration for allowing him to collect these unlawful benefits and has refused to repay the City causing the next step via this resolution.”

Larson, who also writes regular guest essays for The Post-Journal, served as a Chautauqua County legislator from 1985 through 1993 and was Chautauqua County attorney from 1998 through 2005. He was re-elected to the Chautauqua County Legislature in November.