BPD paid consultant $22G for money-saving tips: Funds designated for drug programs
Boston Herald, Saturday, July 28, 2007
Boston police officials paid a private consulting firm nearly $22,000 - using funds earmarked for anti-drug programs - to find a way to save money on undercover BPD cars, according to a Herald review of the Law Enforcement Trust Fund.
The move has some city councilors howling that the money would have been better spent on treatment programs for addicts.
The BPD last year paid Mercury Associates, a Maryland-based private firm that specializes in conducting studies of fleet management services for public agencies, to find "a more cost-effective way to obtain undercover vehicles," BPD Commissioner Edward Davis acknowledged yesterday.
City Councilors Michael Flaherty and Chuck Turner are calling for a review of the Law Enforcement Trust Fund spending from both the BPD and Suffolk District Attorney Dan Conley - who gets half of the monies.
"Boston's substance-abuse epidemic is as much a public health problem as it is a public safety problem," Flaherty said last night. "Treatment and recovery needs to be an equal partner with law enforcement."
Davis defended the study, which was commissioned during the tenure of his predecessor, former BPD Commissioner Kathleen O'Toole.
"I'm not all that familiar with the process that was used to bring a consultant on board. The upshot of the program was that the consultant pointed us in the right direction on a more cost-effective way of obtaining undercover vehicles. It was probably money well spent," Davis said.
The Law Enforcement Trust Fund is comprised of monies seized in drug raids and in the forfeitures of properties and vehicles belonging to convicted drug dealers.
Two years ago, Mayor Thomas M. Menino ordered an audit of the fund after an investigative report by the Herald showed O'Toole used more than $170,000 from the fund to pay a Mississippi-based fingerprint firm to clean out a backlog of unprocessed evidence as part of a no-bid contract. Another $10,000 was used to buy crime-scene cones.
The audit did not find any irregularities, but Menino has since met with BPD top brass to discuss using the money for drug treatment in addition to enforcement, Davis said.
"I am an advocate for giving monies from the fund to treatment and prevention," Davis said.