Scandal probe must focus on the facts

It can be easy to get lost in the weeds of an expanding state scandal that involves school construction, demolition and nepotism, among other issues. But any notion that the issue would blow over was belied by Friday’s departure from the Lamont administration of Melissa McCaw, the secretary of the Office of Policy and Management and the state’s top budget official.

The issue’s many tentacles have already led to the departure of McCaw’s deputy, Konstantinos Diamantis, and, separately, Chief State’s Attorney Richard Colangelo Jr. Arising as it has at the dawn of a gubernatorial election year, the scandal promises to be an ongoing headache for the governor’s office, and challenger Bob Stefanowski and legislative Republicans tout each new piece of bad news as yet another sign of the governor’s vulnerability.

But Lamont deserves credit for Diamantis’ removal last October, for hiring a former U.S. attorney in December to investigate the patronage allegations and for taking a strong stance against Colangelo, whose job security was not under Lamont’s purview but who nonetheless retired this month.

That doesn’t mean the problems are solved — far from it. The ongoing revelations about state and local projects to demolish buildings, remove hazardous waste and perform other major work show a system beset with contradictions, rife with questionable practices and primed for reform.

Take, for example, a story out of Bridgeport, as reported by Hearst Connecticut Media’s Dan Haar. In that case, a demolition job for a former dormitory at the University of Bridgeport went out to bid, which under normal circumstances should lead to the qualified company offering the lowest projected price winning the job.

That’s not what happened. AAIS Corp., a West Haven company, won the bid and has commenced the demolition even as Bestech Inc., of Ellington, said it would charge $3.3 million less.

The city reasoned that the final price paid to AAIS might fall below its bid and that the price offered by Bestech might have required upward adjustments. But under that kind of reasoning, why bid at all?

It’s supposed to be a simple process — the government spells out what needs doing, and companies say how they’d do it and what they’d charge. But as this case among many other shows, it’s rarely that simple.

The Bridgeport case does not implicate the state, even though the companies involved are on the list of likely subpoena recipients in an ongoing U.S. Department of Justice investigation into school construction in Connecticut. One way or another, answers are coming.

Lamont and state Democrats would surely love for these questions to go away as election season starts to heat up. Republicans, for the same reason, want to keep the focus right where it is.

What is needed is a focus on the facts. There are certainly political points to be scored, but that’s not what matters here. What is important is getting to the bottom of how contracts are awarded, on the state and local levels, and how the process could be made better.

Should a parallel investigation to the federal probe be launched on the state level, it must maintain that focus.