See No Evil

Richard Valcich's Letter

Blew Whistle on Payrolls,

But What Was Follow-Up?

The indictment of six people last week by the U.S. Attorney, with the assistance of the City Department of Investigation, broke open the CityTime scandal, which has not yet been denominated as a "-gate". Suggestions are invited; we will honor the winner and thank everyone else. Payrollgate (?) dwarfs many other thefts from the City of New York. This case is a biggie; it deserves a name of its own.

A previous low point in municipal depredation was reached in the construction of the New York County Courthouse under Boss Tweed. That building, at 52 Chambers Street, cost over $13 million in 1867 dollars to build, almost twice the price ($7.2 mil) the United States, guided by a New Yorker, Secretary of State William H. Seward, paid Russia to buy Alaska, whose islands are, on a clear day, visible from Siberia, and vice versa.

There are a number of differences, however, between Tweed's era and the current decade. Because he dominated the political machinery in his day, Tweed and the ring he controlled had the power to steal, whether people liked it or not. In today's ostsensibly more transparent times, the frauds could not have been carried out if the public were aware of what was going on. One issue that will presumably be examined by investigators over the next months is: Who, if anyone, was responsible for concealing from the people to whom OPA reported (The mayor and the comptroller) the massive ongoing fraud, which continued for six years. Did the higher-ups, or their staff members, know what was happening?

An early warning of serious problems with the contracts is laid out in a very specific six-page letter, written in February 2003, signed by Richard Valcich, who at the time was director of the Office of Payroll Administration, which was in charge of the project. You can click here to read the Valcich letter. The entire situation is laid out in an excellent article by David Chen, published across the top of pA28 of today's Times. You must read, at least the lede, to understand what is known so far about the issue.

"Last week, federal prosecutors sketched out what they said was an $80 million scheme to defraud a giant information technology project to automate the payroll system for New York City employees. The participants in the fraud essentially stole the money for their own enrichment, billing the city for work they did not do, the prosecutors charged.

"But some city officials had huge concerns as far back as 2003 about the integrity of the project, whose costs have ballooned by hundreds of millions of dollars.

"In a scathing letter made available on Monday through a state Freedom of Information Law request, the city official in charge of overseeing the project, known as CityTime, accused the company that designed CityTime, SAIC, of repeatedly delaying the project in order to get paid more, failing to hew to basic industry standards and rewriting contracts on its own. The official even predicted, sarcastically, that SAIC would try, in a year's time, to charge the city '8,000 hours' for shoddy work.

"The letter, dated Feb. 19, 2003, offers a devastating critique of the company, and raises questions about the city monitors of the project - the mayor's and comptroller's offices. And the consultants hired to ensure quality control, it appears, were doing very little of it.

"In the letter, Richard R. Valcich, executive director of the city's Office of Payroll Administration, assailed SAIC, a giant engineering company based in McLean, Va., for conducting numerous reviews without approval from the city, other than to 'further delay the project and, of course, increase SAIC's costs.' Mr. Valcich also said 'a certain level of professionalism and compliance with acceptable industry standard practices is expected of a contractor for the execution of a $100 million-plus project.'

"The cost of the project is now more than $600 million, and counting.

"Stating that SAIC's 'commitment to quality is almost nonexistent,' Mr. Valcich also described a document outlining SAIC's plans to finish the project as a 'straw man' and said 'the cost in ill will, damage to SAIC's credibility and reputation within the city, and reduction of expectations within SAIC's team are a high price to pay for this document.'"

The Daily News, which was on the story first, ran today's Juan Gonzalez column on p3, the lead news page. The letter by Valcich was made available in response tor a FOIL (freedom of information law) request made by the News. Their reporter and columnist, Gonzalez, has been writing about the scandal for over a year. Several of his articles were published in the News over at least a year. Apparently, however, they were ignored by the authorities with the power to correct the situation. The headline of Gonzalez' column today: 'CRACKS' GOT BIGGER: Ex-Payroll Boss Blew Whistle on CityTime in 2003 and Nothing Was Done.

Today's Post has a brief item by Sally Goldenberg on p16: MIKE LAUNCHES CONTRACT REVIEW.

"Mayor Bloomberg yesterday ordered all major city technology contracts to undergo another layer of review in the wake of the mammoth CityTime scandal that erupted last week.

"He said Deputy Mayor Stephen Goldsmith will review large 'subcontracting, consulting, billing and record-keeping practices.'

"The biggest scandal of Bloomberg's tenure came to light last week when federal authorities discovered contractors working on an electronic city-payroll system stole $80 million over five years without anyone realizing."

As a result of today's revelations, a dozen new questions come to mind. We know it is easier to ask questions than to answer them, but the City pays millions of dollars to supervise these activities, in order to save the hundreds of millions that may be wasted because of failure to control a gang of thieves, not to mention the contract not being fulfilled.

1. Did Valcich send copies of his 2003 letter to anyone else besides the contractor?
2. Whom did he report to in the Mayor's Office and the Comptroller's Office?
3. Were they informed of the situation?
4. Did SAIC respond to Valcich's letter in any way? If so, how?
5. Did Valcich have any relationship with any contractor after he retired in 2004?
6. Did he write anything at the time of his departure to indicate any concerns about the project?
7. What, if any, was his relationship with his successor, Joel Bondy? Did he recommend Bondy for the job?
8. How were Valcich and Bondy appointed to the OPA position in the first place? How long did Valcich serve? (The earliest reference on the web to his time at OPA is an article from March 1997.)
9. During his tenure, did Valcich ever have contact with oversight agencies, or city investigators, over the situation that was developing with SAIC?
10. Which staff member, if any, actually wrote the letter that Valcich signed? Are the employees who worked on this matter still with OPA?
11. What was the role of Comptroller William Thompson's office in all this? He had leadership responsibility for OPA from 2002 until he left office in December 2009. Did he ever say or do anything about the ballooning costs? Was he aware of the problem? Did someone represent him in dealing with these matters?
12. Who in the mayor's office had responsibility for OPA? Did Valcich and Bondy submit regular written reports dealing with the situation? If they did, who read the reports and what did they do about them? If they did not submit reports, who failed to demand them? If they submitted false reports, did anyone check them?

We ask today, what agencies, if any, are trying to find the answers to all the issues in this case, of which we have simply enumerated the first ten questions? It will take some time to completely solve this massive case. We would hope there would be reports, from time to time, as facts are discovered by the probers.

The fraud here endured for six years. The investigation must not be as protracted as the wrongdoing. Although at first it appears like a case of: Who left the barn door open, and why, it may turn out that there were more serious derelictions on the part of individuals with responsibility to oversee the contracts.

By the way, what ever happened to the payroll reporting system SAIC and others were supposed to produce?

Whose Oversight?

The Six-Year Swindle:

How Did a Rogue Agency

Escape Detection So Long?

Swift action followed yesterday's report of the indictment of six people accused of an $80 million fraud against the City of New York. You can read the U.S. Attorney's office and Department of Investigation's joint press release on the federal indictment here. To get the full indictment, call either telephone number at the top of the release.

The Daily News, which has been reporting for over a year on CityTime and its derelictions, ran a story on p5 today, written by Greg B. Smith, Juan Gonzalez and Adam Lisberg, City Hall bureau chief. The headline: CITY EXEC IN CHARGE OF OVERSEEING PROJECT IS SUSPENDED. The lede:

"Investigators probing the massive CityTime payroll scandal seized $850,000 in cash yesterday from safe deposit boxes linked to consultants accused of stealing $80 million.

"One of the six defendants even showed up at a Long Island bank with a large duffel bag but was turned away, a source told the Daily News."

The Times reported on City Hall's response to the indictments in a story today by David W. Chen and John Eligon, spread across the top of A30, the first page of metropolitan news. Their lede:

"The official in charge of the New York City agency at the heart of the $80 million information technology fraud scheme was suspended on Thursday without pay by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and Comptroller John C. Liu.

"The official, Joel Bondy, was chosen by Mr. Bloomberg to be the executive director of the Office of Payroll Administration in April 2004. But the payroll agency has been repeatedly criticized for its handling of the CityTime project, an automated system designed to streamline employee timekeeping, which has been dogged by delays and enormous cost overruns.

"On Wednesday, Federal prosecutors accused several CityTime consultants - at least one of them a longtime associate of Mr. Bondy - of being involved in a scheme that manipulated the city into steering expensive contracts to businesses that they controlled and of redirecting some of that money for their own enrichment. But the scandal has become one of the most serious that the Bloomberg administration has faced. And by casting a pall over an initiative that the mayor had championed as a hallmark of efficient, computerized management, the case also shines a harsh light on the administration’s outsourcing practices."

The Post covered the bank incident in an article on p10: 'TIME BANDIT' BEAT TO BANK: Payroll-Scam Probers get to $850G First, by David Seifman and Chuck Bennett. The Post's lede:

"Now that's timing.

"A defendant in the $80 million CityTime payroll office scandal arrived at a bank with a large duffel bag yesterday to clear out money allegedly stolen from city taxpayers - but investigators got to it first, officials said.

"Department of Investigation officers seized $850,000 in cash stored in secret safety-deposit boxes just before one of the defendants in the criminal-fraud case sought to cash out, said DOI spokeswoman Diane Struzzi. ...

"Joel Bondy, the hapless bureaucrat in charge of the CityTime fiasco, was suspended yesterday while the city abruptly halted payments to embattled contractor Spherion - Bondy's old employer.

"His suspension without pay is a first step to termination, sources said.

"Bondy, the $205,180-a-year executive director of the Office of Payroll Administration, was seemingly asleep as allegedly corrupt 'quality assurance' contractors brazenly looted taxpayer coffers with sham corporations.

"'Any violation of the public's trust is categorically unacceptable, and we are implementing a series of changes to reform oversight of the CityTime project,' said Mayor Bloomberg."

The Post ran a harsh editorial on p32, IT'S MIKE'S MESS. The Post is generally supportive of the mayor, but this editorial alludes to grievances that may have accumulated over time.

One thing overlooked on Day One was the significant role of the City's Department of Investigation in exposing the fraud. US Attorney Preet Bharara said: "I want to praise Commissioner Rose Gill Hearn and her DOI team for their exceptionally quick and diligent work in this matter. Working with our partners, we will continue to ferret out public corruption and prosecute those responsible to the full extent of the law."

Commissioner Hearn said: "The shame is that a project to save time and money on the City payroll fell prey in part to the accused swindlers who cost the taxpayers a stunning $80 million and counting. The supposed experts hired and paid well to protect the city's interests were exposed as the fox guarding the hen house, secretly pocketing millions and purchasing expensive homes and cars, it is charged. Ironically, when CityTime's hand scanners got in their way, they even resorted to fudging paper timesheets, according to the Complaint.

"DOI investigators methodically followed the money to reveal the deception and end the shell game. DOI and the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York continue to investigate this brazen scheme and are committed to pursuing this case to its just conclusion."

One person who deserves great credit for his work on this case is Juan Gonzalez of the Daily News. A sad aspect of this case is how long his repeated warnings, published in the News, were not acted upon. Councilmember Letitia James of Brooklyn held hearings on the subject, but her complaints may or may not have reached Speaker Christine Quinn, the public official to whom the administration is most likely to be responsive.

There should be an inquiry into the city's handling of this fraud during the six-year period over which the conspiracy is said to have operated. Also, why did not other employees of OPA complain about what was happening around them? No inquiry, however, should disrupt or delay the vigorous prosecution of the alleged perpetrators.

We should also remember that this not the first time that honest people have been duped by unprincipled swindlers. What is unusual here is the period of years over which the fraud occurred, its magnitude, and the apparent complete lack of oversight over Joel Bondy and the OPA. Similar events have occurred in prior administrations, where honest mayors are betrayed by corrupt subordinates, of whose very existence they were barely aware.

Part of the problem here may be that since OPA was a two-headed agency, responsible to both the Mayor and the Comptroller, neither provided the close supervision that now appears to have been badly needed. Another aspect of the case is that since the project itself was opposed by the unions who had no interest in accurate timekeeping, critics of the contract may have been dismissed as naysayers, even though they were right about the contract.

We also learn the lesson again that it doesn't matter how many oversight agencies exist, the system often relies on individuals being honest and doing their jobs responsibly. When people lack integrity, the cost can exceed even the $80 million which is reportedly missing. As an individual and a taxpayer, I would want those convicted to remain in prison until all the money is returned. They stole from all of us.

The perpetrators should receive plenty of time to make the acquaintance of Mr. Madoff, with whom they could trade notes. Their enablers should consider less demanding employment.