Yesterday the public radio show, APM Marketplace, aired a business story from a local WHYY reporter, Bobby Allyn, where I was asked to comment on the City of Philadelphia’s recent, no-bid purchase of police body cameras from Taser International.
Here is an excerpt from the story:
Sitting in his office on the 31st floor of a building in Center City Philadelphia, attorney Chris McCabe read the wonky language of a memo prepared by city officials.
“Currently the city has no procurement vehicle for these specific goods and services, and a competitive bid for these services would be time prohibitive,” McCabe said, reading the memo.
It means that the city hasn’t opened up a formal bidding process for a $1.4 million body camera contract expanding a pilot program. Doing so, officials determined, would take too long. McCabe, who negotiated city contracts for more than a decade, said it was unusual, and that the bidding process was there so that contractors win not based on whom they know, but instead on who has the best price.
“You have to protect the taxpayer from fraud, corruption and favoritism, and that’s done through a publicly transparent competitive bidding process,” McCabe said.
You can read and listen to the entire Taser story here.
My earlier post on the City’s no-bid purchase of the police body cameras is here.
Christopher I. McCabe, Esq.
