Independent Review Fails to Uncover Flawed Bid for $55 Million Contract

Oops. Looks like former Administration Secretary, turned Independent Procurement Expert, Mark Bugher missed another stinker in his thorough review of DOA procurement practices earlier this year.

According to current DOA Secretary Steve Bablitch, Bugher’s independent review found the state's contracting process "fundamentally sound.” Both Governor Doyle and Bablitch claim that the Adelman Travel contract fiasco that resulted in the conviction of a state official was simply an isolated incident.

But Bablitch’s Executive Assistant Sean Dilweg disagrees. Dilweg acknowledged that another contract process led Doyle contributors to threaten suit after one of its competitors won a contract with the state.

"If we would have moved forward with Prism, we would have had a mess on our hand," Dilweg said, calling it a flawed bidding process. "Our only option was to rebid it to have a clean slate."

The flawed process to which Dilweg refers took place at the end of 2003 and the decision to redo the bidding process was made in early 2004, months before Adelman Travel first appeared - or not - on the radar screen of DOA management.

The bid for the Kenilworth project is the second in a series of isolated incidents that include curiously timed contributions to Governor Doyle’s campaign as well as a meeting featuring DOA Secretary Marc Marotta who never ever inserted himself into the procurement process.

So much for independent reviews.