Editor’s Note: Tysam Tech disputes the accuracy of the Source’s reporting below on the lawsuit between Ohio-based Gandee and Associates and the V.I. Housing Finance Authority, particularly as it relates to VIHFA’s awarding of contracts to Tysam, which is not named as a party in the suit. The Source is working with Tysam to clarify these issues and will update the article once a resolution is reached.
The V.I. Public Finance Authority board breezed through more than $14 million in disaster recovery-related contracts Wednesday, authorizing V.I. Disaster Recovery Director Adrienne Williams-Octalien to execute a trio of environmental consulting contracts collectively worth nearly $11.6 million.
Williams-Octalien presented all three of the recommended environmental technical consultant services contracts simultaneously, explaining that D&B Engineers and Architects, Rittenhouse Consulting and Tysam Tech were the only three responsive bidders who submitted proposals following a solicitation last year.
“So based on the experience, qualifications and resources and overall ability to provide the work, the committee deemed that we should enter into contracts with all three to be able to provide the services — and for the territory to have the necessary capacity to process all of the environmental requirements for each of these projects simultaneously,” she said. “We were concerned that one contractor would not be able to provide all of these services in a timely manner.”
The contract awarded to D&B came in at $8.44 million. The company, based in Woodbury, New York, describes itself as a “team of 225 men and women” who “hail from engineering, scientific and environmental disciplines, are active in industry associations and have received awards” from numerous industry associations.
The contract with Rittenhouse Consulting, which was founded by former Sen. Alicia Barnes, was valued at nearly $1.98 million. The company’s website boasts Coastal Zone Management compliance work for the Hibiscus Beach Hotel, Green Cay Marina and Clinton E. Phipps Race Track, development of the territory’s Integrated Solid Waste Management Plan and work on a use variance for a controversial block manufacturing facility owned by Just Right Trucking.
The 35th Legislature approved the variance in April 2023 over guidance from the V.I. Department of Planning and Natural Resources, which noted that the Estate Orange Grove site did not allow for industrial activity. An online petition against the development that month garnered more than 900 signatures. The Rittenhouse Consulting website states that the company provided “technical expertise in support of a public awareness campaign to address public misinformation regarding the proposed block manufacturing activity.”
The third company, Tysam Tech, was tapped for a nearly $1.18 million environmental consulting contract. The company figured prominently in a lawsuit filed last year by another environmental consultant, Ohio-based Gandee and Associates, which alleged that the V.I. Housing Finance Authority improperly rescinded contracts and awarded others at “grossly inflated” prices to a competitor — Tysam — despite an apparent conflict of interest.
In a civil complaint, Gandee alleged that VIHFA awarded at least five contracts to Tysam even though the company missed a mandated proposal deadline and that the authority’s “preferential treatment of Tysam Tech appears even more suspect” because the authority’s former senior environmental manager, Kyora Veira, began working for Tysam three days after leaving her post at VIHFA. Gandee further alleged that it lost a Sejah Farm contract to Tysam because it was not “the lowest responsive bidder.” Gandee bid $11,000 and Tysam bid $35,255, according to the complaint.
In September, a federal judge enjoined VIHFA from awarding seven of the disputed contracts and wrote that there “is reason to believe that public funds may be saved by a reevaluation of the awards,” adding that in “more than one instance, VIHFA failed to adhere to its own rules.” The record, U.S. District Court Chief Judge Robert Molloy wrote at the time, “strongly suggests a violation of duty has occurred, and it unfolded like the ‘Emperor’s New Clothes’ — the bare truth was laid out but no one at VIHFA spoke up.”
VIHFA Executive Director Eugene Jones abruptly announced his resignation during a Senate Housing, Transportation and Telecommunications Committee meeting Wednesday.
During Wednesday’s PFA board meeting, members also authorized execution of a four-year, $2,555,740 contract with Kahua Inc. for use of its project management information system. Before moving into executive session, the board approved amendments to the V.I. Disaster Recovery Office’s procurement policy to give Williams-Octalien more leeway to execute contracting documents and to expand the number of people authorized to make purchases up to $5,000.
“You know, this is a classic example of what I’m talking about,” Gov. Albert Bryan Jr., who chairs the PFA board, said Wednesday. “It’s like, there’s so much work in the territory. Even if you bid, everybody get a job. If you can’t find work in construction … something must be wrong.”
