From Brian Lockhart CT Post:
The City Council would have been told in writing about the no-bid, $400,000, taxpayer-funded driveway to Manuel “Manny” Moutinho’s waterfront mansion if budget cuts hadn’t depleted the purchasing office, the city’s acting purchasing agent said Wednesday.
“The department consisted of 13 people. We are now down to four,” Berndt Tardy–who at the city law department’s request OK’d the driveway work–told the council’s Ordinance Committee on Wednesday.
Full story here,
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City Council was either Absent or Tardy!
Check the minutes!
www .bridgeportct.gov/filestorage/87203/97366/97368/99220/2012-10-22Sp.pdf
Berndt Tardy has been doing this, skipping the entire bidding process, at the bidding of the administration, for much longer than back to 2008! If you start looking for bid waivers from the mayor, good luck finding them. Although they will probably appear out of nowhere as soon as someone screams about it. Check police and fire purchases!
*** So for five years they have been skipping the city bidding process and bypassing anyone who might have a question or problem with the procurement decisions. But rest assured the Mayor’s office got a memo and then business as usual, no? This is a crock of B/S to cover this admin’s continued reckless spending ways of doing what they want, when they want it! And the sad part is the City Council will probably accept it hook, line and sinker. How can they sleep at nite knowing they’re used and manipulated time and time again with the same old song and dance on a regular basis! Then they wonder why so many people complain about city government and their actions. *** WAKE UP AND SMELL THE BURNED COFFEE ***
Come on Berndt, you could do better than that. What a lame answer. However, having worked in the system I know that was not your answer. Mark/Lisa as always instructed you on what to say anytime there appears to be a problem.
*** As a city councilperson, the last thing you want to do is stop or slow down city business that’s on the up & up and good for the city in general. However, the council needs to send a hard message to this admin. that seems to only play ball when it needs something! Instead of going along with the usual (we’ll get back to you on that) or last-minute paperwork info and expect a yes vote 10 minutes later. The council needs to start voting “no” or tabling important issues and “stop” rubber stamping admin-pushed city business! *** MAKE A UNITED STAND OR STAND ALONE, BUT DO SOMETHING ***
It’s called gross negligence. Nothing new for the current Administration and City Council. Why doesn’t the Connecticut Post do an article on the many violations of the City Charter and City Ordinances? It would take up most of a daily paper.
Lennie, don’t you think that at this point it’s kind of “Tardy” (late) to be informing the council about all this?
This is a travesty.
“The city’s procurement rules would have required Tardy to notify the council within five days of waiving competitive bidding for the driveway. But Tardy said around 2008 he sent a memo to all departments–and Mayor Bill Finch–explaining he no longer had the staff to issue those required internal alerts.”
So for 5 years Bern Tardy and the Mayor have failed to issue written notifications of bid waivers. A city employee and the mayor decide that due to budget cuts they don’t have to follow city ordinances.
“The ordinance does not give you an option,” said Council President Thomas McCarthy, D-133.
So Council President McCarthy, what is your council going to do? I believe the city can levy daily fines for failing to adhere to ordinances.
Let’s see how quickly Attorney Anastasi and Deputy Labor Director McCarthy claim there is nothing they can do.
This is criminal. Every contract awarded via a bid waiver for which notice was not provided to the council should be declared null and void and the city should seek restitution from the illegally named contractor.
I also believe city officials who knowingly violate ordinances can be held personally liable. So if we can’t collect from the contractors maybe we should go after Finch and Tardy and squeeze them. Let’s see what happens.
Is Tardy the same person who’s the President of the City of Bpt Supervisors Union? Talk about incest!
I’m not sure if anyone is aware of this one little fact about Mr. Tardy; he is extremely visually impaired. We’re talking almost blind. So when he says he didn’t SEE something, he’s telling the truth.
At the time of Ganim’s departure for some time with the Feds, the City Council (of which Bob Walsh was a member) studied, proposed, and approved a very expanded and perhaps complicated document regarding the many faces of purchasing.
Take a look at the paragraphs that fill out this particular ordinance. Do not stop at this point and point a finger at Tardy and feel satisfied, what other parts of that set of City rules has not been lived up to? Annual reports of purchases? Triennial audits? And those are things the INTERNAL AUDITOR was tasked to perform. So if a CAO or OPM director or King Finch decide an Internal Auditor is not needed, then the City Council rules are not followed? Is there no member of the current Council (or former memeber like Bob Walsh or Mojo, perhaps) who would have noted these and other difficulties before “The Gravel Driveway” appeared? Tardy’s office had a “ghost employee” listed for several years along with many departments. Are those the decisions of a department head in this administration? Not from anyone talking about such things today.
And what about common sense ‘performance evaluations’ regularly performed, perhaps with some public input on departmental experiences? Would they do anything to justify the size of departments? Assuming purchasing has been cut by 7-8 workers in the last decade, has their output decreased in similar fashion?
If we are out to point fingers, keep them aimed at our Council representatives who have been too conflicted to care what others in Bridgeport or the region think of their unavoidable conflicts. Let’s ask them to account for why they make rules and then fail to follow them. Good information about how the City runs reported regularly and timely is the enemy of corrupt government operation. It only takes some interested folks to follow the trail and shake all of the trees to see what falls out. Time will tell.
Bravo, JML!
*** Five years of excuses are like poop-holes, everybody’s got one, no? *** Lord knows what else has gone by the wayside without any required city hurdles to jump! ***
*** Not a peep from the Mayor’s Office on “GRAVEL GATE!” ***