No bid to a no-name company? Dayton Airport deal suspicious

Whenever I see a no-bid deal involving any local government body, I start questioning the process.

From today’s Dayton Daily News:

Dayton International Airport is requesting City Commission approval to pay a company up to $36,000 over three months to recommend a new telephone system at the airport.

The commission will be asked today to approve the contract with JYG Innovations LLC, which will not supply the new system.

The Clayton company is to assess what is needed for an upgrade to a voice-over-Internet-protocol phone system and to help the city shape plans for the new system, according to documents prepared for city commissioners.

Last week, the Commission approved a three-year contract with the same company, paying it up to $90,000 annually for a three-year total of $270,000, to provide information technology and support services to the airport. That includes IT systems engineering, design, implementation, security monitoring and problem-solving.

The city did not seek competitive bids for either contract, instead opting to directly hire JYG under “professional services agreements,” said Stanley Earley, Dayton’s deputy city manager.

The company, which was registered with the Ohio secretary of state in 2009, is certified as a minority-owned, female-owned and small business enterprise in Dayton’s procurement program, according to city documents.

Dayton hired JYG because it has expertise suitable for these contract needs and its personnel have worked with the city and know its systems, Earley said. Dayton would seek competitive bids for larger contracts, he said.

via Airport wants to study new phone system.

What’s even more fun is that JYG Innovations LLC is calling itself a minority-owned company and apparently getting bonus points for it. What about other minority-owned companies? Shouldn’t they get a chance to bid as well? (The City of Dayton does not consider Veteran or Service Disabled Veteran Owned Businesses worthy of special consideration,  despite the Feds having a 3% SDVOB contracting mandate).

I went to look up the registration of the website- and find they registered www.jyginnovations.com by proxy- to hide the registrants’ info. Luckily, they list their CCR registration on the site and their CAGE code 5X0W5 – where I find thanks to the SBA site:

Jacqueline Gamblin

Jacqueline Gamblin

JACQUELINE GAMBLIN 180 FIVEPINES CT CLAYTON, OH 45315-9657 IT Consulting services focused on IT Strategic Planning, Business Process Improvement, Business Intelligence and Information Security.

Then I go to LinkedIn- where I find I have connections to her through 4 people, including Pete Hager who is ourchasing manager for the city. She worked for Ingenium from 1997 to 2009 before starting JYG Innovations with her last title VP.

She has a BS in Biology from WSU earned in 1990

Ingenium seems to be one of those huge companies that small businesses like to call a “Beltway bandit” with HQ in Maryland and primarily be involved in government contracting. They have a local office in Dayton.

Her maiden name is Yokley and she graduated from Wayne HS in 1985 (that answers why it’s JYG)

Manta tells us she has a staff of 1 and annual revenues (before the no-bid contracts) of under $100,000 a year.

Her PTAC page- (PTAC is a government paid-for operation to help small businesses do business with the government) is almost blank: http://www.ptacconnect.org/company/view.asp?iLookupCompanyID=10593

She is the chair for “Involvement Advocacy” in Dayton- which is a group started by Peter Benkendorf (with whom I grew up in Cleveland Heights) to support the arts- and his Blue Sky Project among other things.

I’m not able to connect the dots to why she got this contract without having to bid- or allowing others to have an opportunity to bid, but I’m pretty sure one of my readers will make the connection before the day is done.

For an IT professional, the idea of hiding your domain registration by proxy is stupid. Incredibly so. It’s for that reason I kept digging and finding and pursuing this. The Internet has no hiding places.

It’s unfortunate that the DDN missed the bigger no-bid contract last week. Miss Gamblin just got a $102,000 a year job, without having to be hired- or going through an open-hiring process. The contract which was approved last week- actually started on Nov. 1, 2011 according to the non-ADA compliant posting of the meeting agenda http://www.daytonohio.gov/cco/Commission%20Agendas/2011/11-16-11%20Agenda.pdf

Apparently, this is the hiring of an independent contractor to work on site- and possibly subcontract two other positions via her company. There is no indication if she is to hire onshore for those other positions (she could be hiring someone in India to do her server admin or security work if my quick read of the contract is correct).

This is not the way an honest, open government operates.

I am unable to decipher from her website her history of expertise in this specific project, or a track record of doing this kind of work solo. The firm is less than 2 years old and lists zero clients, or references.

Please enlighten me, this looks like hiring someone’s lover to a sweet paycheck with zero oversight.

additional info:

Here is the contract scope on the $270K work from the city agenda- note the original spec included VOIP services:

  • Consultant will perform the following work and services for the City’s Department of Aviation:
  • Perform server system administration and operations.
  • Monitor data backup processes.
  • Maintain desktop computer systems.
  • Assist users with problem resolution.
  • Monitor network availability and operational status.
  • Monitor system security posture including antivirus signatures, system patches, Pix
  • firewall rules, and ISA server.
  • Manage user add, remove, and changes in Active Directory.
  • Provide IT systems design and implementation guidance.
  • Communicate status of project activities and actions with the Airport IT staff.
  • Infuse new technologies into the environment as requested.
  • Provide final-tier problem resolution services as requested.
  • Assist with VOIP implementation.

Consultant shall assign one of its Programmers to provide on-site (at the Airport) support and off-site (remote) monitoring support to provide the Professional Services up to a maximum of twenty (20) hours per week during the term of this Agreement. In addition, Consultant shall provide Application Engineer, Senior Systems Engineer and Systems Engineer labor categories to provide Professional Services on an as needed basis and upon the verbal or written preapproval from the City’s Director of Aviation or his designee.

If you want to look at the whole agenda in an ADA compliant form (unfortunately- the OCR reoriented the internal links) I’ve done the OCR for you: 11-16-11 City Of Dayton Agenda ADA compliant

 

 

 

 

 

 

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