Original URL: http://www.jsonline.com/news/state/nov05/367809.asp

 

DOT official's role murky

Document suggests organizer of Doyle fund-raiser signs off on contracts

By PATRICK MARLEY
pmarley@journalsentinel.com

Posted: Nov. 2, 2005

Madison - Contrary to claims by Gov. Jim Doyle's administration, the state transportation official who invited dozens of consultants to a Doyle fund-raiser has the last word on which firms get more than $100 million in engineering contracts annually, a state document suggests.

Department of Transportation officials and aides to the Democratic governor continued to insist Wednesday that Deputy Transportation Secretary Ruben Anthony Jr., who organized the Sept. 8 fund-raiser for Doyle, plays no role in selecting which firms get state work.

Yet the department's quarterly schedule for approving engineering contracts lists Anthony as the final person to "concur" with recommendations on who gets the contracts, which totaled more than $100 million last year.

Anthony was in meetings all of Wednesday and unavailable to answer questions, said Chris Klein, the top aide to Transportation Secretary Frank Busalacchi.

He said Anthony is simply notified of who will get the work by a committee of civil servants. He has never changed which firms get work, and never could under a new policy set early this year, Klein said.

"On that grid, I have no idea why they use the language of 'Ruben concurs,' " Klein said. "I guess that's a misnomer of a word. It shouldn't read like that because he doesn't concur on anything. He's just being notified on who's picked.

"He doesn't sign off on anything. When it comes to him, it's a done deal."

Approval system changed

The department changed who approves which engineering firms get DOT work early this year, but has yet to write a formal policy on the new procedures because the agency is in the middle of a management reorganization, said John Espie, the statewide consulting engineer, and Randy Knoche, a DOT contract manager.

Since February, Espie has forwarded proposed changes to his superiors, he said.

Sending the wrong message

George Mickelson, an official with the union that represents state engineers, said the schedule with Anthony's name on it raises questions about how the process really works.

"They're burdened with a lack of credibility," he said.

That union, the State Engineering Association, has long been at loggerheads with the department over how much engineering work is outsourced. The fund-raiser organized by Anthony makes it appear that state work is for sale to political contributors, Mickelson said.

"I don't know if something is going on, but if you're looking at perception, there clearly are some issues with perception," he said.

Anthony organized a Sept. 8 Middleton fund-raiser for Doyle, inviting dozens of employees of such firms as HNTB Corp., CH2M Hill Inc. and Ayres Associates that get state engineering contracts.

Advocates of campaign finance reform blasted the event, saying it created the appearance of a conflict of interest.

For 15 years or more, regional DOT employees had selected which engineering firms got work in their districts. After reporting which firms they wanted to do the work, Espie, a mid-level DOT official in Madison, signed off on the plans, only rarely making changes.

Engineering contracts are given to firms before the DOT knows how much the companies plan to charge. Price is not considered because of a federal law that requires the agency to select firms based on their qualifications, rather than their price.

The process is meant to prevent the state from selecting firms that design unsafe roads by cutting corners.

Once a firm is chosen, the state enters negotiations on price. If the parties can't come to an agreement, the state can cut off talks and pick the second-highest ranking firm.

The regional offices rank the firms that they believe can best do each job. Espie reviews those rankings to make sure each firm isn't getting more work than it can handle, and to ensure that businesses aren't being squeezed out of state work.

New system

The new process established in February allows him to get a better sense of which firms are getting work because jobs are now reviewed quarterly, he said. Before, he would see jobs just one at a time, which made it difficult to know how much work individual firms were getting.

Espie now makes recommendations on the short lists to his superiors. Kevin Chesnik, the political appointee who oversees the Division of Transportation System Development, has the final say on selecting the firms, Espie said.

Chesnik was out of the office Wednesday.

The secretary's office has little to do with the selections, Espie said.

"In my opinion, it's done more as a briefing than as, 'What do you want us to do?' " he said. "They don't get into the details as much as I do."

Of approximately 100 engineering contracts approved a year, about five are changed, he said. Espie said any changes are made based on recommendations he has made.

The approval process was changed this year because too few people oversaw the awarding of contracts in the past, said Klein, the aide to Busalacchi.

"When this administration came on board, it was one person making the decision on these contracts, on who would get it," he said. "We changed that to a committee simply because we didn't like the process. . . . It wasn't really open."

While the department's approval schedule shows Anthony as having final approval on the contracts, the agency's flow chart for contract approval shows only civil servants approving the contracts. Klein said the flow chart shows Anthony does not sign off on the contracts.

Doyle was in central Wisconsin Wednesday and could not be reached for comment.

Asked earlier this week if he believed having the deputy secretary invite people who do state work to the governor's fund-raiser created conflicts, Doyle said: "You asked everybody you could find who went to it and not one of them said that there was anything improper that was done. My understanding is there was not any violation of any state campaign law."

Jay Heck, executive director of campaign finance reform advocate Common Cause in Wisconsin, said Anthony acted improperly in arranging the fund-raiser even if he does not directly approve the contracts.

"It's really not a question of whether he had direct involvement in awarding the contracts," he said. "It's the fact that he holds a very high position in the Department of Transportation, which awards these contracts. . . . People, when they see such a top state official actively helping to arrange a fund-raiser, it sends the signal that if you want to do business with the state, you need to be at the fund-raiser."

Brian Swenson, who heads HNTB's Wisconsin operation, said last week that one of his firm's employees went to the event, and that no one at the company felt pressured to give.

Bill would restrict donations

On Wednesday, state Rep. Terri McCormick (R-Appleton) unveiled a bill that would bar contractors from making political donations from the time they submit a bid to the time the work is completed. Such a provision would prohibit the employees of large engineering firms and road builders from giving to candidates because they are almost always working on a state contract.

"There's a conflict of interest when you take political contributions from groups that are bidding on contracts," said McCormick, who is running for the 8th Congressional District seat being vacated by U.S. Rep. Mark Green (R-Green Bay), who is a candidate for governor.