Chronic plague at City Hall

Well, you can't say you weren't warned.

Early last year, Richmond Auditor Umesh Dalal wrote a scathing report saying that the city's poor purchasing habits left it susceptible to fraud.

Among his findings were that the city ignored its own bidding procedures and didn't always shop for the best price. City officials tended to skirt requirements for competitive, sealed bids on purchases of more than $50,000. At least nine cases were uncovered in which no bids were sought for purchases exceeding that level.

According to the audit, emergency powers were used to avoid purchasing regulations in several cases where Dalal deemed there was no emergency.

The report recommended that the city implement the state's bidding software, in which about 32,000 vendors compete for contracts. Dalal estimated the software could save Richmond about $5.1 million.

This advice was resisted by the city administration under then-Mayor L. Douglas Wilder, who had a keen eye and sharp tongue regarding school-system waste but was loath to address city department issues.

Wilder's gone, but those issues remain.

Richmond Commonwealth's Attorney Michael N. Herring is investigating whether the city broke the law in its purchase of police cars in 2007.

The nearly $1 million purchase violated procurement rules. Sheehy Auto Stores of Richmond -- without competition from another vendor -- was awarded the contract to provide 40 Ford Crown Victoria police cruisers, at an average price of $24,838 per vehicle. That's $4,212 more than the base price the Virginia State Police paid for Crown Victoria cruisers that same year.

City code requires all public contracts with private vendors to be awarded after competitive sealed bidding or negotiation. It's hard to discern what was behind this cozy deal, though I'm sure other Ford dealers would love to know. Eric R. Mens, director of procurement services, has delivered his resignation.

You'd be hard-pressed to find anyone more sympathetic to Richmond's plight than me. It suffers from the burdens of poverty, urban isolation and affluent -- but too-often indifferent -- neighbors.

All this is no excuse for the chronic waste that has plagued City Hall. Wilder, too busy picking fights, never got around to cleaning the "cesspool of corruption and inefficiency" he lamented before moving Richmond toward its current form of government. In his wake, City Hall needs a politician with the tools of Roto-Rooter to flush out what is either endemic incompetence or blatant fraud.

This latest disgrace didn't occur on Mayor Dwight C. Jones's watch, but it's now in his lap. He must get the city's payment and purchasing houses in order and weed City Hall of scandal.

Until that happens, Richmond will never have the credibility it needs to wield any sort of leverage with its suburban neighbors, who will cite City Hall's propensity toward squander and scam as a reason not to partner.

City residents, meanwhile, will retain good reason for their lack of faith in government if this isn't fixed.

The symptoms of this chronic disease are well-documented. Jones needs to come up with a cure.

Contact Michael Paul Williams at (804) 649-6815 or .