FAIRFIELD — City Council members said Wednesday they have worked out a compromise to move forward on the community center — but only until after November's election.

        At that time, if voters do not approve an income tax reallocation that would pay to build both the community center and an either expanded or new justice center, City Council will re-evaluate their options. “It is my opinion we would have to decide which one we would build first,” said Councilman Ron D'Epifanio.

        Fairfield officials envision a 45,000-square-foot community center with a theater as a capstone to the new downtown, Village Green. But they also want to either expand the overcrowded and outdated Fairfield Justice Center or build a new one. Each project will cost about $10 million.

        “I think we are over the hump and ready to move ahead,” Councilman Mark Scharringhausen said. “We have found the mechanism which we can all agree on and move forward on both projects and the reallocation.”

        The informal arrangement will be formally voted on at Monday's council meeting, when council decides whether to spend $275,000 on design and other plans for the community center, Mr. Scharringhausen said. That money will carry the project through to the November election.

        The issue has resulted in a rare spate of public squabbling among the usually amiable council in recent weeks. Tempers peaked last week when Councilman Jeffrey Holtegel — a staunch community center supporter — sent, then apologized for, an e-mail critical of the justice center staff and city's municipal judge concerning a recent needs assessment survey of the justice center.

        Mr. Scharringhausen and two other council members had objected to moving forward on the community center until after the election. The majority of the council, four out of the seven members, supports going ahead with it.

        The city can afford to build the community center or the justice center. But to do both at the same time, voters this fall will be asked to shuffle 0.1 percentage point — or about $1.2 million a year — of the city's 1.5 percent income tax from the street improvement fund to the general fund.

        Voters have approved similar measures in the past and if the money is not moved, there will be a $7 million surplus in the street fund by 2006, Mr. Scharringhausen said.

        There will be no tax increase for voters and council members say they are confident it will pass.

        After the tax shift, $3.5 million will remain in the street fund, plenty to cover road projects on the books for the next five years, he said.

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