Legal loophole opens door for ‘sweetheart’ deal
Ex-county official’s firm gets no-bid $99,900 contract
NO QUARTER
Milwaukee County ethics rules are clear on the issue.
A former county worker must wait at least 12 months before getting a contract to work for the county.
So a number of red flags went up when the county Behavioral Health Division awarded a no-bid, $99,900 contract in February to Cambio Solutions, a firm owned and run by Alicia Modjeska, who was chief operating officer for that very agency until February.
County Comptroller Scott Manske initially raised objections in March, noting that Modjeska was “president, principal and signer of this agreement” on behalf of Cambio.
But officials with the Behavioral Health Division had a ready reply.
The state law passed in 2014 putting that agency under a new Milwaukee County Mental Health Board exempted its employees from county ethics rules. It, instead, said they were bound by state ethics rules.
“County ordinances do not apply to BHD employees since the enactment of Act 203,” said Kimberly Kane, spokeswoman for the Behavioral Health Division. “State ethics rules do not prohibit Ms. Modjeska’s professional services contract.”
Milwaukee County Board Chairman Theodore Lipscomb Sr. was not happy to learn of the loophole created by the
new law, which stripped the board of mental health oversight. Lipscomb also took a shot at Milwaukee County Executive Chris Abele.
“Awarding sweetheart contracts is wrong, but the Abele administration is finding new ways to do it out at BHD,” Lipscomb said. “The Mental Health Board should put an end to it all by holding to the safeguards in the county’s procurement and ethics rules.”
“Ethically, this is not right,” said Supervisor Willie Johnson Jr. at a Thursday meeting of the county Finance and Audit Committee.
Abele spokeswoman Melissa Baldauff defended the contract, calling Modjeska a caring mental health professional who is helping transform mental health care in Milwaukee.
“It’s no shock that the chairman is trying to bash the county executive — that’s apparently his full-time job,” Baldauff said. “But with no real basis for a political attack, he had to resort to Trump-style tactics. County employees — current and former — deserve better than having their names dragged through the mud in the media by elected officials.”
Modjeska made about $120,000 per year in her county job.
According to county records, Manske’s office “stated concern with this arrangement“because of Modjeska’s recent county job.
In response, behavorial health staff pointed out that they were not bound by county ethics rules but agreed to take the matter to the Mental Health Board “for transparency” even though this wasn’t required to do so because the contract was below $100,000 — if just barely. Manske then signed off on the deal in early April.
At the Mental Health Board meeting in late April, Michael Lappin, administrator of the Behavioral Health Division, defended the arrangement.
Lappin said Modjeska had been a key player as the agency looked to outsource acute care to local hospitals. With the contract, he said, Modjeska would help make sure that his agency didn’t suffer any setbacks.
He appeared to dismiss the relevancy of the county rule barring former county workers from getting county contracts for 12 months after they leave.
“The intent was and the rule is that people don’t retire, accept their pension and then contract back for services,” Lappin said. “That isn’t the case with Alicia. Alicia was not here long enough; she’s not eligible for a pension, so this is more or less her doing us a favor.”
That may be part of it.
But the County Board adopted the 12month provision in the county ethics rules in 2016 after the previous director of the Department of Administrative Services was awarded a contract with a division previously under his direction.
Supervisors approved the change over the concerns of Abele, who neither signed nor vetoed the measure. But he did respond in a written statement, calling the change another example of “micromanagement” by the County Board.