Guest Op-Ed: Regarding the Ed Smith Stadium Contracts

We appreciate the coverage that the Bradenton Times and Mr. Shea gave to our meeting regarding the bidding/procurement audit conducted by the Sarasota Clerk of the Circuit Court (Karen Rushing) in July 2010. This subject is incredibly complex and the article covered just one meeting in an ongoing process. I would like to clarify some of the issues detailed in the article to ensure that readers have an accurate and complete understanding of the issues.

Reading the article, one might get the impression that there was a single procurement in question, but there were two separate procurement processes discussed in the Clerk’s audit.

The first was a Request For Qualifications (RFQ) for baseball negotiations facilitator in the fall of 2008; the second a Request For Proposal (RFP) for an Owner’s Representative in July-September of 2009. Public records reveal evidence that winning vendors for both jobs (Mr. Dan Barrett and International Facilities Group) had contact with County staff during the respective procurement periods and provided selection criteria used by the County. The actions of the vendors and staff appear to be in violation of the 2009 County Procurement Manual, Section 6.8.6, which states:

During the time when the document is being drafted, the advertising period, the evaluation period, and as appropriate after recommendation of award, the Business Unit shall have no contact with potential or actual proposers, and shall direct all communications regarding the RFP to procurement.

When asked about e-mails demonstrating contact between vendors and staff in 2010, Karen Rushing said “That is totally ‘ick,’ There’s no other way to describe it. Nobody’s happy with what was in those e-mails, but they didn’t violate the code.”

But the Clerk’s audit never specifically mentions Section 6.8.6, side-stepping a potentially egregious aspect of the irregularities that occurred with both procurement processes. Why?

To further clarify, Larry Arnold, referred to by colleagues as the county’s resident baseball expert, did not serve as the head of the selection committee that chose IFG as Owner’s Representative in 2009--as the article states. But Mr. Arnold was appointed to serve on the selection committee by Deputy County Administrator Bullock, despite having a personal relationship and significant contact with IFG (the winning bidder) during the RFP drafting period. The Clerk’s audit states that Mr. Arnold ceased to have contact with IFG after he was appointed to the selection committee, but we can find no such exception in procurement code that would allow his participation under such circumstances.

The Clerk’s audit did not exclude e-mails between County staff and the vendors (the article says it did) but rather, the Clerk’s audit omitted e-mails between vendors Dan Barrett and
IFG indicating Barrett’s assistance to IFG in securing County business. The e-mails between Mr. Barrett and IFG were public record and easily accessible to the Clerk’s office, despite statements to the contrary in the Clerk’s report.

Mr. Barrett did not submit the Orioles contract (MOU) to the Orioles for revision, but rather to IFG. IFG's review of the Orioles contract for "red flags" was done free of charge for the County. Mr. Barrett simultaneously was positioning IFG for success in winning the owner's representative contract, and later reminded Mr. Bullock of the free help IFG provided.

A near elimination of IFG from the bidding competition came during the preliminary evaluation of written proposals in September, 2009 – not in the final round as the article suggests.

Mr. Arnold asked that IFG be included among the finalists although it appeared that a majority of the selection committee had expressed concerns about the proposal submitted by IFG. Committee members expressing concerns told the Clerk's auditor that they did not know of Mr. Arnold’s pre-existing contact and relationship with IFG. Mr. Arnold’s presence on the committee was instrumental in preventing the early elimination of IFG. Yet the Clerk’s report found that no undue influence took place.

As Mr. Shea writes, we found the Clerk’s audit report did not clearly lay out the sequence of events and actions of vendors and Sarasota County staff to the reader. The procurement communications held in the Clerk’s files do not seem consistent with a fair and open bidding process, where there is a level playing field and no company has an “inside track”.

The goal of our meeting was to present our findings to vendors familiar with county procurement problems and get their feedback. Given recent firings and transfers of county employees for procurement irregularities, which include the use of county credit cards to avoid competitive bidding, the Clerk’s office is currently taking a more comprehensive look at county procurement practices.

In a recent interview, Ms. Rushing says that the County is looking into several aspects of the county purchasing practices, and asking questions such as, “Was there some process in place among county government where they were steering business to one place or another?" This and other questions should have been considered in the Clerk’s 2010 audit. Did the self-imposed limits on last year’s audit allow problematic practices to continue?

Ms. Rushing now acknowledges "It's imperative that we do a thorough job.” We agree. Given the contact between County staff and vendors uncovered in the 2010 audit, and the Clerk’s conclusion that policies were followed, it is time to expand the current investigation and to review again what occurred in 2008 and 2009. An independent organization should conduct this review.

Cathy Antunes
Sarasota Citizens for Responsible Government