And no, not baseball games, we probably won't see those baseball games for a year or longer with the mess at the Dunkin Donuts Park project.
The games being played are those by the City of Hartford and the Hartford Stadium Authority.
On May31, 2016 I made a formal Freedom of Information request to the City of Hartford, specifically to Sean Fitzpatrick of Development Services. In that request I asked for "any and all change orders submitted to Centerplan or DONO, LLC for the Stadium Construction during May 2016"
In numerous media reports and TV interviews I had heard the "change orders " referred to by both City Officials and representatives for the developers.
Fitzpatrick apparently referred my FOI request to Cynthia Lauture in the Corporation Counsel's Office. A week later I had heard nothing nor did I receive any documents ,and I emailed Lauture for an update.
The following day I received an e-mail from Attorney Lauture claiming that "there are no responsive records to the request below". I replied back that I wasn't interested in playing her games. Within an hour I received the appropriate documents through an alternative source. The City did eventually provide the requested documents when they realized I already had them.
WHAT? I knew there were documents because I had heard numerous references to them by many individuals. I spoke to a City Hall source and was told that what are normally known as "change orders" in the Construction industry had been renamed something else by the Stadium Authority and Development Services, possibly to avoid anyone being to ask for them. Try asking for the "CCD's" I was advised, in the City's terms the "Construction Change Directives"
Ok, I guess that is that "transparency" we keep hearing so much about. Maybe the City could have been a little more creative and called them "Stadium Heirarchy Intermediate Transmittals" or more appropriately "S.H.I.T." orders. I think that would be more appropriate to the transparency they are trying to feed us.
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4 comments:
That's a new low for the Corporation Counsel's office and doesn't bode well for future transparency. They'll just get better at obfuscation.
But...don't keep us in suspense! Were there change orders? Were they necessary due to health and safety and compliance with codes (City side) or whimsical changes that were completely unnecessary (DoNo side), or somewhere in the middle.
Kevin, I have expressed this before to you that you are our local guardian angel. But don't let it go to your head, please. Form a nucleus of trusted friends so this this work can carry on in your abscense. I will tell you this soon face to face. You have found the Golden Grail of Kabuki Theater and the invisible strings that pull the puppets.
This is a working model that must be replicated.
Can you post the change orders/CCDs? I'd love to read them. We should be able to see whether the Stadium Authority or the City was paying attention to anything progressing on this project. I would love to see the changes the City requested to line items that benefit the city or its employees. Is there a Mayor's Luxury Box?
I'm eagerly awaiting the posting of these documents!!
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