Montville — A state police trooper who says he was unfairly denied a seat on the town’s Parks and Recreation Commission says the experience has motivated him to launch a campaign for a seat on the Town Council.

All seven seats on the council are up for election in November, and Jeff Rogers says he plans to run for one of them to “drain the swamp” of Montville politics.

Rogers, 48, said he already planned to run for townwide office before he was denied one of four open seats on the Parks and Recreation Commission. But he says the 5-2 vote against his appointment to the commission was personal or political, or both. He said it reflects corruption in the town’s government that he hopes to rectify by running for the council himself.

A Boy Scouts scoutmaster, wrestling coach and youth baseball and softball umpire, Rogers said he believes he's more than qualified to serve on the commission.

Commissioners serve as a sounding board for the Parks and Recreation Department’s director, set department policies and have a final say on the Parks and Recreation budget request each year.

Four people resigned recently from the commission, leaving open spots. Five people applied to fill those seats and sat for interviews with the Town Council in December, including Rogers.

“I’m not discrediting any of the people who put in for it,” Rogers said. But, he said, “there is nobody there who had a resume like mine.”

Rogers said he believes the five members of the Town Council who voted against his appointment, all Democrats, did so for personal reasons or because he has been active in Republican town politics.

“I’ve been very civically involved for a long, long time,” he said. “If you can tell me what these people bring to the table that is better, or more, or different, than what I have, then fine, I can accept it.”

Rogers said he got no such explanation. All five Town Council members who voted against Rogers’ appointment either declined to comment or said they thought the four other candidates were simply more qualified.

The council unanimously approved three of the five applicants, Jennifer Hajj, Danielle Butzgy and Dawn Penman. Rachel Belardo was appointed to the commission on a 5-2 vote with the two Republican councilors, Kathleen Pollard and Joseph Rogulski, opposed.

Now Rogers, taking a phrase used by supporters of President-elect Donald Trump, said he’s been motivated by Monday’s meeting to “drain the swamp.”

A lack of integrity, he said, has “trickled all the way down into the lowest level. When it comes to a point that you lose sight of what you’re doing, that’s a problem.”

The same night of the meeting, Rogers posted on Facebook announcing his candidacy for the Town Council.

“I truly want to serve my community and it looks like Montville has a Democratic Swamp that needs to be drained,” he wrote. “I officially announce my candidacy to run for Town Council. Please support me to help clean this corrupt cesspool up and rid it of these democratic non-leaders!!!”

If he runs as a Republican in this year’s municipal elections, Rogers has until mid-July to secure a nomination from the Republican Town Committee and file with the Town Clerk’s office.

He said he has no intention of changing his mind.

“I’m definitely going to do it,” he said. “See this as my official throwing my name in the hat.”

Rogers grew up in Preston and said he has lived in Montville since 1993. He said he has worked in law enforcement for the state for nearly three decades after serving in the military, first as a Department of Correction officer and later as a state trooper, including time as the school resource officer at Norwich Tech.

In 2011, a judge in New London Superior Court put Rogers on a special form of probation that wiped his criminal record clean after he was charged with third-degree assault and risk of injury to a minor following a traffic stop in which he punched a 15-year-old who had been riding a motor bike on a roadway several times.

Rogers is still a state police trooper working out of Troop E in Montville. He said his job does not make him ineligible for running for public office.

He said that during his career as a scoutmaster, 24 people have become Eagle Scouts under his guidance. In 2012, a Boy Scout in Rogers' troop built a box installed at the town’s transfer station meant to serve as a place to collect discarded flags so they can be ceremonially retired and burned.

“Nobody in town has that kind of track history,” Rogers said.

He had been registered as an Independent since the age of 18, but registered as a Republican during the 2016 election.

“I got sick and tired of the way things have gone,” he said.

Rogers has planned to run for office in Montville for a while, he said. He said his experience last Monday just catalyzed that decision, and he compared the decision to the lesson he teaches the baseball players he has coached when they lose a game.

“I’m walking away gracefully,” he said. “And I’m letting them know I’m coming back tomorrow.”

m.shanahan@theday.com