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| FEMA: Julius W. Becton, Jr.,
Director of FEMA at the time of the contested set-aside. Since Mr. Becton is black,
Fay Communications felt that he might be sympathetic to a small firm (Fay) which was being
racially victimized by Becton's own agency. |
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Repeated efforts to enlist Becton's assistance in reversing this wrongful decision went
unanswered. In a five page letter to Mr. Becton in 1987, Fay Communications
wrote: "What we have been asking all along is for the SBA to allow free and
open competitive bidding... (t)he SBA's role is to foster and protect all small
businesses. ... FEMA does have a voice in how the SBA proceeds in this matter. ...
"
Fay's plea to Becton fell on deaf ears. (Note: This is the same Julius W.
Becton, Jr. who failed last year in his attempt to rescue the Washington, DC school
system.) |
| FEMA: Clay Hollister,
program officer for the contract in 1987. Clay Hollister was the FEMA point man that
broke the news to FayComm that the owner was the wrong color! Mr. Hollister refused
to talk with Fay or his attorney's following initiation of Fay's law suit. Mr.
Hollister's name also never appeared in any of the court records. |
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Instead, Hollister's (more expendable) colleagues filed all the affidavits on behalf of
FEMA. Mr. Hollister managed to "keep his hands clean" so that he could
proceed with his career advancement into a very well-paying, secure career in the Senior
Executive Service (SES).
| FEMA: Patricia English,
contract officer. After filing her affidavit near the beginning of Fay's legal
action, Ms. English mysteriously "went on leave" and could not be reached by
Fay's attorneys during most of the legal proceedings. |
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| SBA: Melvyn Goodman,
SBA's designated "in-house" advocate for Technical Resources,
Inc. A substantial part of Mr. Goodman's job was to see that TRI and other non-white
owned firms received as much government set-aside money as possible. A short note
from TRI's president (Tony Lee) to Mr. Goodman was all it took to get Mr. Goodman to leap
into action and snatch the FEMA contract from competitive bidding and place it into the
set-aside program. The handwritten note was produced during the discovery phase of
Fay's lawsuit, and the note read as follows: |
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| Melvin (sic); I would appreciate
it if you would send out the attached search letter. FEMA is combining our current
contract with another non 8(a) contract to come up with a combined project.
We can do all of the work, but FEMA
could use some encouragement to go 8(a) on this. ["Going 8(a)" is government-speak for excluding
businesses owned by white males. Editor.]
Thanks.
(signed)
Tony [Lee, president of Technical Resources, Inc.] |
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The "search letter" referenced in the note was a nicely typed draft that Mr. Lee
-- a private contractor -- had been kind enough to prepare for Mr. Goodman's
signature. The "search letter" was addressed to Ms. Patricia English,
FEMA's contracting officer, from Goodman at the SBA. The first line of the letter
read "The Small Business Administration requests that the subject buy order be
set-aside for an 8(a) procurement and the contractor that SBA recommends is Technical
Resources, Inc." |
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Be sure to also see "Discovery Documents" for the actual text of both the
handwritten note and the typed draft supplied to SBA by Mr. Lee.
Other SBA documents provided during discovery seemed
to indicate that Mr. Goodman's "analysis" of TRI's request was extremely fast
and informal.
Like Ms. English (above) Mr. Goodman
mysteriously "disappeared" after filing an affidavit in Fay's law suit.
Upon further efforts to reach Mr. Goodman, the SBA informed us "Mr.
Goodman is no longer employed by the SBA."
TRI: Except for TRI (Technical
Resources, Inc.) being referenced in the legal record as the wealthy, Asian-owned company
designated for the set-aside, for the most part, TRI's employees' names did not appear in
the legal record.
| FEMA: Bernard B.
("Bruce") Marshall. Mr. Marshall was FEMA's "program
officer designate", apparently destined to succeed Hollister as program officer on
the project. Throughout the whole legal proceeding, Mr. Marshall remained mute on
the quality of Fay's previous work for the agency and on the excellent working
relationship FEMA had enjoyed with Fay Communications. |
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