Colasante Ethics Complaints to be Heard in New Year

By Cynthia Drummond for BRVCA

December 14th 2024

PROVIDENCE – The adjudicative hearing on ethics complaints against former Richmond Town Council member Michael Colasante has not been scheduled, but a date could be set early in the new year.

Katherine D’Arezzo, the Senior Staff Attorney at the Rhode Island Ethics Commission, is prosecuting the case.

“We are going to have an adjudication on this, and I am in touch with his [Colasante’s] attorney to try to look at a date,” she said Friday. “We don’t have a date picked out yet, but it will be in the earlier part of 2025. We’re just looking at dates, so I can’t give you a specific date. We might have some more information at the next meeting in January as to what dates. You’re probably looking at something in March, a few months out, because we would need to prepare for it.”

The next Ethics Commission meeting is on Jan. 7.

The Complaints

In June, 2024, the Ethics Commission determined that there was probable cause to uphold three complaints, filed in 2023  by then - Town Council President, Mark Trimmer, against Colasante, who, in November, lost his bid for reelection to his council seat.

All three complaints involve Colasante’s relationship with Jeffrey Vaillancourt, who served briefly as the town’s Electrical Inspector before he was dismissed in January 2024, following numerous complaints from business owners regarding his conduct.

The first ethics complaint states that Colasante violated a commission regulation “by receiving the assistance/or services of Jeffrey Vaillancourt, a licensed electrician serving as the Town of Richmond’s Electrical Inspector relative to the performance of an underground electrical installation and related excavation at the respondent’s property at 71 Buttonwoods Road in Richmond in August, 2023.”

The second complaint involved Colasante’s violation of a second commission regulation “by receiving the assistance and/or services of Jeffrey Vaillancourt, a licensed electrician serving as the Town of Richmond Electrical Inspector relative to a 2023 request to Rhode Island Energy to provide electrical service at the respondent’s property at 71 Buttonwoods Road in Richmond.”

The third complaint involves Colasante “receiving a gift in the form of a Town of Richmond Electrical Inspector Jeffrey Vaillancourt’s payment to [electrical contractor] Angelo Palazzo, for the cost of electrical permit #5414 for the respondent’s property at Buttonwoods Road in Richmond.”

The Adjudicative Hearing

An adjudicative hearing is similar to a regular court procedure and is the next step in the complaint process.

The Ethics Commission describes the hearing as an “adversarial process” during which the prosecutor, in this case, D’Arezzo, and Colasante’s attorney, Joseph Larisa, will present evidence and examine witnesses. Commissioners will also be able to question witnesses.

The hearing is expected to take place immediately following one of the commission’s regular meetings and will be available for viewing online.

At the conclusion of the hearing, the commissioners will vote on whether the violations did occur. Complaints not supported by sufficient evidence will be dismissed, and for complaints that are upheld, the commission can impose a fine of up to $25,000 per violation.

Commission decisions can be appealed in Rhode Island Superior Court.