Damaging subpoena on airport contracts withheld

Th e revelations prompted Bottoms’ nascent administration to begin releasing documents that had been withheld or delayed by the Reed administration.

Those documents included credit-card statements for Reed and his cabinet, payroll records, outside legal bills — and an explosive 2016 federal subpoena asking for information about lucrative airport contracts awarded to the mayor’s political supporters, and financial records for three cabinet members.

Withholding the subpoena showed Reed’s determination to keep damaging political information from the public. State law required disclosure, after the AJC and Channel 2 requested all such documents related to the investigation.

As the AJC and Channel 2prepared a story on the subpoena in May, Reed issued a statement claiming he was justified in withholding the document because it was “unrelated to the federal bribery investigation.”

In fact, the subpoena was issued in the name of the federal grand jury considering the City Hall corruption case. Among the 10 points of information sought: the “ranking and/or re-ranking” of companies competing for a $12 million annual contract to manage a billion-dollar airport construction program; and records related to airport concessionaires run by two firms with close ties to Reed.

Reed also kept the subpoena secret from City Council,which approved four multi-million dollar contracts without knowing they were part of the federal investigation. It was finally released by the Bottoms administration, after the AJC learned of it from a source and specifically named it in an open records request.

PART TWO

FILE PHOTO Reed’s firing of airport chief Miguel Southwell in 2016 cost taxpayers millions of dollars in outside attorneys fees and resulted in a secret settlement that Reed withheld from residents and City Council. The dispute also led to a federal subpoena, which Reed also withheld.