VOUCHER CRITICISM:
Firms get $3M in 2015; city’s total payout $17.6M
Parents of specialed students call rules unfair.
Former City Council member Tom Marshall’s firms received another $3 million in city contracts last year, bringing the city’s total payout to the two firms up to $17.6 million.
Marshall’s OT Marshall Architects PC also received two subcontracts, roughly $50,000 each, through real estate firm CBRE for work on the city’ s renovation of the Donnelly J. Hill building and for the relocation of the South Main police precinct last year.
Marshall received scrutiny for the number and size of his firms’ con- tracts last March after at least one architect filed an anonymous complaint with Tennessee Comptroller Justin Wilson. Since then, Marshall’s firms received the two contracts — both through Housing & Community Development — in addition to the subcontracts.
This year, Memphis has a new mayor in Jim Strickland and a new HCD director in Paul Young. Both said Tuesday that con- tracts would be awarded fairly.
“My administration will have a fair, open and competitive process for contracts,” Strickland said in a statement.
Young said HCD won’t have a default contractor, but will “welcome” all qualified vendors to participate.
Marshall’s most recent contract was signed by former mayor A C Wharton on Dec. 29 — fewer than three days before he left office — giving OT Marshall Architects $444,000 to design a $4. 3 million seating upgrade at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium.
Back in March, at about the same time The Commercial Appeal published a story on the contracts, Wharton and former Housing & Community Development director Robert Lipscomb approved a nearly $2.6 million contract for architect ure/engi neeri ng, program management and construction administration on a Raleigh Springs
Mall redevelopment. That contract went to Marshall-Toles, a joint venture between Marshall and local minority contractor James Toles.
Asked about Marshall’s other contracts last March, Lipscomb said he would have a committee of his employees at HCD review contracts to avoid the “appearance of favoritism.” Lipscomb approved all of the contracts except the latest one, which was approved by then-interim director Debbie Singleton.
Lipscomb resigned in August after he was accused of statutory rape of a then-16-year-old boy. Memphis police are still investigating those allegations, but no charges have been filed.
Marshall didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment. But in March, he said he stood by his company’s work, and clarified that much of the contract amounts go to subcontractors.
State law forbids municipalities from bidding out professional services work, which encompasses architectural, engineering and construction management services. Under the city’s current policies, directors choose who gets professional service contracts, including legal and construction-related work.