Sunday, April 24, 2011

EOC Director adopts the Nuremberg defense




WLBT followed up its Thursday night story about Hinds County failing to obtain permission from the state to purchase $113,000 of police radios with another one Friday night. WLBT interviewed Hinds County Emergency Operations Center Director Jimmie Lewis. Mr. Lewis told WLBT he was only doing what the board ordered him to do.

Editorial comment: This entire episode has become a farce on several levels. The Board tries to help its "consultant" Nathan Hargrove by giving him a contract to sell EF Johnson police radios to the county. The cost is $113,000. Supervisor George Smith tells the media in interviews and comments published on media websites the radios were purchased and "were paid for". The only problem is, this website discovered no payment was ever made for the radios, there is no mention of the purchase on the claims docket, and Hinds County violated state law by failing to obtain the required permission from the Mississippi Wireless Communications Commission since the purchase was over $100,000. Mr. Smith had no defense when WLBT pointed out his statements were not true.

However, something else must be addressed here and that is the hiring of Mr. Lewis. Larry Fisher retired as Director of Hinds County EOC in 2009. His assistant worked in the EOC for twenty years and possessed numerous certifications. Unfortunately for Ricky Moore, he was white as the Board instead hired Mr. Lewis, the Director of Permits and Zoning who was also black, on a 4-1 (the four black supervisors voted for Mr. Lewis) vote even though he had no experience in emergency operations.

Why is Mr. Lewis's hiring mentioned? Because if Mr. Lewis was qualified for his job (Resume and application for EOC Director), he would have KNOWN a basic law such as obtaining permission from the state for all radio purchases over $100,000 existed. The Attorney General stated in a 2009 opinion for Lee County (Opinion No. 2009-00057) such transactions made without the commission's approval can be reversed. The auditor's office told WLBT Thursday the state can force whoever approved the purchase to pay the money back to the county.

It is quite obvious negligence took place regarding the purchase of the EF Johnson radios. The question is whether such negligence took place because county officials did not know the law or instead chose to ignore it. Mr. Lewis can claim he was following orders all he wants but if I were him, I'd get on my knees and pray the purchase is reversed or the Board is responsible since it approved the purchase. This is what happens when unqualified people are hired for jobs due to their race or because they are part of "the system". Unfortunately for Hinds County residents, the fact the county is broke has not made any impression on county officials and forced them to take their jobs more seriously.

6 comments:

reximus said...

I would make a snide comment about how much better my County's BOS is but I live in Madison County...

Anonymous said...

Hinds county is in a league of its own.Madison county can not touch what is going on in Hinds.

Anonymous said...

Serious question - does it really matter whether the BOS was ignorant of the law vs deciding to ignore the law? Either way, they broke it, correct?

Anonymous said...

"A purchase order exists but has probably not been paid for."

Whoever signed the purchase order is responsible for ensuring that proper procurement was followed. By signing the purchase order the purchasing agent obligated the county to pay for the radios within 45 days of delivery. In the eyes of the law a government purchase order is no different from a check.

If it gets down to a pissing contest and Hinds County refuses to accept the radios the vendor will have a right to sue. If the county can't legally pay the money the purchasing agent's bond will pay $50,000 and the county board or the purchasing agent will be on the hook for the rest. Of course the bonding company will be looking to recoup their money too.

The board will have to prove the purchasing agent acted fraudlently or neglegently to escape liability. Good luck with that defense.

The board's only hope is to work out some "secret" agreement to return the radios in exchange for "committing" to make a future purchase from the vendor. With Hinds County's shady dealings that shouldn't be a problem.

Curt Crowley said...

Kingfish, you know damn well Ricky Moore's race had nothing to do with Lewis getting hired. It was actually the fact that Lewis had a masters degree in PhysEd, thereby making him more qualified to be Emergency Operations director.

Anonymous said...

It goes without saying that if you have a master's degree in PhysEd, you have absolute mastery over side straddle hops....and, of course, that Emergency Operations thingy....


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