City Contracts - The Proverbial "Golden Goose"

[Rico]

In Tuesday's City Council meetings there was discussion of the mowing contracts and if they were being done often enough..?

This is a can of worms that the City is losing Millions on... I say this from a personal investigation for a few contracts that were to have been done by contractors in my neighborhood.

Here is the way it seems to work:

You bid on a contract... preferably one that is not something that would jump out at the citizens of Tulsa.. Like say..Mowing the grass in a City park that is in an obscure part of town, mowing the medians in a section of town, and one of my favorites...Street Sweeping..

Sounds good.. The City states, "they get it done cheaper than they could do the work themselves.."

Here is the problem:
The City has a person in charge of Contracts and Planning, This person has 2 employees that are inspectors that make certain that the "Contracts" are being done..  There are more than a couple of hundred "Contracts" maybe more than that.  
Let's see... Say three hundred "Contracts" with varying completion times and dates... many of them repeat or cyclical contracts that are done 6 to 8 times a year. Take this and try to figure how two inspectors can verify the "Contracts" are being done on a timely basis.. If at all...!

To top this off, The City of Tulsa does not have a consolidated data base that lists all the "Contracts" the City has in a particular Neighborhood, Zip Code, etc.....
To find out what "Contracts" the City has, one must, go to each and every Department that could have contracted work being done and compile your own list.. This would include Public Works, The Parks Department, etc...

Back to the "Goose and the Golden Egg".. In my neighborhood, alone, I was able to find two contracts that the Contractor was not doing the work but had been getting paid on a regular basis........ Another that the work was being done on an irregular basis and in a hodgepodge manor. One of the "Contracts" was for 300K a year.. another was in excess of a Million.......... Starts to add up doesn't it..?

These individuals did not lose the "Contract" as the City would not be able to prove that the work had not been done..

The Gentleman that is in charge of "Contracts" told me that Mr. Lafortune saw fit to cut the budget within his Department and the number of Inspectors that he could have on his staff. That, "He was aware that there must be certain "Contracts" that were not being done... But the Department simply did not have the manpower to verify all........"

For the sake of the City of Tulsa I hope that this Administration is able to get a handle on this problem...!

Here is an article from Today's Tulsa World in regards to the mowing issue..


Osage Trail weeds prompt councilor to pursue cuts
By P.J. LASSEK World Staff Writer
6/1/2006

City Councilor Jack Henderson wants the city to find funds to mow high weeds along the newly opened Osage Trail.

"The weeds are high enough that the boogeyman can jump out and get you," Henderson said he was told by a resident who was complaining about the conditions.



Henderson questioned the city's mowing policy during Tuesday's council committee meetings. By late Wednesday morning, mowing had begun near the trail at 46th Street North.

"There's something wrong with this picture," he said Tuesday about the height of the grass along the paved trail, which stretches from downtown to 56th Street North.

Henderson said that when he helped dedicate the completed trail in November, "I said all these flowery words and talked about how nice it was and how nice it would be for the people. Then I start getting all these calls about the high weeds."

The council was told that funding this fiscal year, which ends June 30, allowed for only one mowing of city trails. The Public Works Department's budget request includes funding for six to eight mowings next year.

The council is assessing the $545.6 million budget proposed by Mayor Kathy Taylor. The council is set to vote on the budget at its June 15 meeting.

Henderson said the complaints prompted him to drive by the trail at Pine Street, where new sod had been laid before the dedication ceremony.

"It was beautiful then, but it is just growing and growing," he said. "From Pine Street all the way up, it looks bad."

Henderson said he can't believe that the city would invest the money in a trail and then not keep it up.

"That is a waste of real money to put that in and not take care on it. If you don't take care of it, the people won't use it," he said.

"I wouldn't want to ride a bike through there and wonder what is going to jump out of the weeds and get me, and I'm a pretty big boy," he said.

Councilor Bill Christiansen said finding adequate funding to maintain the city's growing infrastructure -- whether it is trails or streets -- is an issue.

"When the sales-tax revenue doesn't go up, it's difficult to pay for these things," he said.

Henderson said the trail is beautiful and provides a link to the north all the way to Skiatook.

"This is a trail people are going to be using," he said. "It is a safety hazard with the weeds that high. It just seems like we would do more than what we've been doing."

The $1.2 million, 10-foot-wide Osage Trail begins at OSU-Tulsa and extends along the right of way of the former Midland Valley Railroad to 56th Street North.

Construction of the trail was funded with 2001 third-penny sales-tax revenues and federal money. A 16-mile extension of the trail to Skiatook is being paid for with Vision 2025 funds and is expected to be completed next spring.