A dispute over whether or not the state’s Division of Transportation adopted its personal bidding guidelines in awarding a 35-year lease to function the state’s service plazas will now be the topic of a state Senate oversight listening to.
Based on the chair of the higher chamber’s Publish Audit and Oversight Committee, state Sen. Mark Montigny, MassDOT’s resolution to simply accept a bid provided by a overseas firm over one other provided by a Bay State-based agency requires “full transparency,” contemplating the “long-term nature of this agreement, the significant public resources involved, and very legitimate concerns raised.”
“All too often complaints regarding opaque procurement practices and behind-the-scenes relationships are swept aside and buried underneath the plethora of government bureaucracy. The committee will pursue all available means to ensure that the department’s process adheres to the highest levels of transparency and accountability,” the Democratic state senator stated in a press release.
The committee will hear “invited” testimony from the events concerned within the June resolution to award the 35-year service plaza revitalization and operation lease to Dublin-based Applegreen over Waltham-based International Companions on September 24 at 1:30 p.m.
Within the meantime, Montigny stated that it will be greatest if MassDOT holds off on finalizing the contract with Applegreen and “should immediately cease contracting activities as requested by the committee.”
International Companions Chief Working Officer Mark Romaine advised the Herald that his firm is glad to see the Senate step in and demand transparency.
“For months, Global, community partners, and lawmakers have raised serious concerns about conflicts of interest, ethics violations, and a troubling lack of transparency in this process. This hearing marks an important step toward accountability. Nearly $1 billion in guaranteed taxpayer revenue was cast aside in favor of a risky, private-equity proposal riddled with red flags. Massachusetts deserves to know why,” he stated in a press release.
The contract dispute erupted after MassDOT’s Board of Administrators, at their June common assembly, accepted the advice of Applegreen by their bid choice committee and over the objections of dozens of International workers and supporters, lots of whom expressed concern that the bid course of was mired in conflicts of curiosity.
Final week, MassDOT launched communications between choice committee chair Scott Bosworth and several other folks concerned in Applegreen’s bid to International Companions following a information request. Based on International, the textual content exchanges exhibit that Bosworth had too shut a relationship with the successful bidder, its development companion, and its lobbyist.
International despatched a letter to MassDOT late final week urging them to carry off on finalizing the contract over what was apparently proven within the texts. The businesses named by International — Applegreen, Blackstone Companions, and Suffolk constructions — all pushed again on their interpretation of the textual content exchanges, noting that not one of the launched supplies contained any dialogue of the Request for Proposal course of that led to Applegreen’s choice.
After the discharge of the texts, MassDOT advised the Herald that even when Bosworth’s bidding scores weren’t included within the bid choice course of, Applegreen’s bid would nonetheless have received the contract over International Companions.
Applegreen and MassDOT didn’t instantly return requests for remark over the upcoming listening to.
