The no-bid micro contracts awarded to vendors at the center of a bribery scandal are rife with wildly inflated costs, an analysis finds.
How much does it cost NYCHA to change a lightbulb?
In one case, more than $708 per bulb.
That’s the rate the housing authority paid one vendor, who submitted a total bill of $4,250 to replace six LED bulbs and covers at Throggs Neck Houses in The Bronx, according to records reviewed by THE CITY.
Another vendor billed NYCHA $4,985 to replace one door to a compactor room. Yet another charged $4,875 to put in slip resistant rubber treads on a stairway with 15 steps — a cost of $325 per step.
When law enforcement officials arrested 70 current and former NYCHA workers on bribery charges earlier this month, they identified small no-bid contracts for apartment repairs, awarded to select vendors in exchange for cash to superintendents, as the source of corruption.
What prosecutors didn’t say was that many of the bills submitted by the vendors who win these so-called micro-purchase contracts raise serious questions about whether NYCHA wound up paying them hundreds of thousands — or even millions — of taxpayer dollars in inflated costs over the years.
All of these bills had one thing in common, a review of contract data by THE CITY found.
The vendors sought compensation as close to the maximum allowed at the time on each contract, regardless of the work performed. Micro contracts have a built-in incentive for vendors to bill for just below the maximum allowed — $5,000 until late 2019, $10,000 since — no matter what the scope and value of the task at hand is.
One vendor charged $4,950 to replace 48 LED bulbs and light covers in the Robinson Houses in East Harlem. The same vendor then charged nearly the same amount ($4,980) to replace just 12 LED bulbs and covers at the Throggs Neck Houses in the Bronx. Weeks earlier that same vendor charged slightly less ($4,250) to replace just six LED bulbs and covers at Throggs Neck.
They might notice, that the actual cost of the LEDs and count of LEDs is secondary to fielding an entire crew for a day. Its a cost plus model. My guess is that if you want this company to show up with a crew, price starts at 4k. Everything after that is cost plus, but the base price to get a crew on site is 4k. In other news, shit is expensive.
It’s also possible for a particular lightbulb to be expensive to replace because it’s in an awkward location, and takes hours of labor to gain access, or really specialized tools and equipment.
Not saying that happened here. But it’s certainly conceivable.
