Style Weekly
Thursday, June 30, 2011
City Auditor to Review Jail Contract
Tempers flare during City Council work session, Umesh Dalal enters the room.
Posted by Scott Bass on Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 4:00 AM
At the request of four City Council members, City Auditor Umesh Dalal is delving into Mayor Dwight Jones selection of Tompkins Builders and S.B. Ballard Construction to build a $116 million jail in the East End.
In a letter to Dalal June 28, Council members Marty Jewell, Bruce Tyler, Doug Conner and Reva Trammell are requesting the city auditor’s “professional assistance in determining whether the procurement processes and procedures regarding the Richmond City Jail procurement was conducted properly in accordance with state law” and the city’s procedures.
In the letter, written by Jewell and signed by Tyler, Conner and Trammell, the council members request a “review and/or audit, if you deem it necessary in order to advise council prior to a vote on this contract.”
Dalal’s involvement is heightening tensions as City Council weighs Mayor Dwight Jones’ proposed agreement with Tompkins/Ballard. Some have questioned whether the process was fair, and whether the East End, where the current jail now sits, is the best location for the new jail. The mayor has asked for City Council’s blessing by the end of July, in order to have an official agreement in place by Aug. 5.
Following a two-hour work session Thursday night, wherein in Council members quizzed city officials about the jail procurement process, the Dalal letter sparked a heated exchange between Council President Kathy Graziano and Jewell.
“We could have avoided sitting here for two hours with questions being asked one way, another way, up the way and down the way,” Graziano, visibly unnerved, told Jewell as the meeting was breaking up.
Jewell shot back: “I challenge anybody in this room to tell the public that we, this council, don’t want to be confused by the facts,” Jewell said, adding that Dalal would provide much-needed expertise. “Does anybody here find something wrong with that? Does that sound like it’s something crazy?”
Dalal told Council members that his office could complete an initial review of the jail contract procurement process by July 13, council’s next work session. Afterward, however, he said it was certainly unusual to be asked to review a contract before it’s been awarded. “It doesn’t happen all the time,” he said, adding that in fact it was the first time he’d been asked to review a proposed contract.
Comments (4)
Showing 1-4 of 4
Graziano was unnerved, eh? Wonder why? Key here is whether Dalal will determine if Art Hungerford's original proposal, which came in half a million less (!) than the Ballard proposal, INCLUDED the cost of the land. Jones' people claim it DID NOT -- word on the street and in quiet corners of City Hall is that it did. Dalal will need to determine whether the procurement process was hard-wired to ensure the Ballard bid won out. In order to do that, he needs to look at more than the proposed contract and compare and contrast not only both proposals, but get statements from the 11 people who reviewed the proposals.
like
dislike
Very interesting, I am glad to see the City Auditor will review the Contract before it is accepted. I question why the Mayor is doing the recommending in the first place however. I would think the professionals in the Department of Public Works would be recommending the proposal, and would be doing so based on the bids and the resultant short-list and subsequent interviews. Lets see a copy of the letter signed by the official(s) in Public Works.
I would also like to learn more about the alleged minority participation in the Mayor's choice. I know that in order for a company to qualify as a Minority Contractor in Richmond, they must be owned or operated by at least 51% by an African American, but what does that actually equate to in numbers of African Americans that will be working on the project at levels above laborers ? If the firm does not consist of at least 51% African Americans at all levels, what did we actually gain, or how did we actually promote African Americans? It would seem to me that the one fat black guy at the top would make out like a bandit, but he is likely already wealthy.
Dalal needs to find out exactly how much has been spent on AECOM and get the employment histories of all the key players -- including John Winter AND Ken Johnson -- in order to determine how this "construction management" mess is REALLY being handled.
AECOM is a joke as is Ken Johnson. The City has employees qualified to handle the tasks these clowns were hired to do, and City employees are paid only a small fraction of the cost AECOM.
Other Publications
