Tuesday, January 15, 2008

The Official HSOA 411

Disaster rebuilder faces storm of its own

Nagin flown on plane

Fireline also used to lease a plane owned by Marshall, the company owner, for $37,500 a month. When Home Solutions bought Fireline, it took over the lease, but began paying Marshall $70,000 monthly.

As it happens, Marshall's private jet is the one that a year ago ferried a group that included Nagin, his wife, and former New Orleans Chief Technology Officer Greg Meffert to Chicago for the Saints-Bears playoff game.

Nagin was invoiced $1,852 for the trip, the cost of commercial tickets for him and his wife, said Aaron Bennett, one of Sewell's three partners in Associated Contractors. Another Bennett company, Benetech LLC, had landed a deal to run the mayor's office of technology less than a week before the game.

Bennett handled the invoicing because the mayor was his guest. Several months later, Nagin paid him, using public money, records show.

Fradella said the company stopped leasing the plane in October.


Several months later....right. It should read: Several months later, after it became public knowledge that Nagin had flown on the plane....he got an invoice.

Then he paid for it with public money? Is the city paying for his ass to attend football games?

Also...take note that Benetech got the IT contract without a formal bidding process. Much the same way Meffert got it when Nagin took office and issued an emergency procurement to bypass an RFP.

Now...back to 311...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Associated Contractors. How much did they get for the schools? Where does one go for that info?

Anonymous said...

Our city is floundering due to lack of money, and Ray Ray thinks it's the equivalent of two first-class airline tickets???

Of course, this is completely secondary to the real problem, which was the acceptance of the trip in the first place.

Mr. Cerasoli, I hope you're reading this blog, and plenty of other ones.