City Comptroller
John C. Liu stated the following in response to news of the Department of Investigation’s (DOI’s) Emergency 911 probe:
“We
welcome Mayor Bloomberg’s belated decision to probe the problems in his
upgrade of the City’s emergency 911 call system.
Our office began investigating those problems three years ago, and our
2012 audits uncovered $1 billion in mismanagement, waste, and possible
fraud in that project. In response, the mayor called our efforts
‘stupid.’
“Better late than never, Mike.”
Background
The
following chronology shows the actions Comptroller Liu has taken to
investigate and ameliorate the mismanagement and cost overruns plaguing
the upgrade of the E911 system, which is known inside City government
as the Emergency Communications Transformation Program, or ECTP.
In
March 2012, Comptroller Liu
released an audit that found that from its inception ECTP had suffered
severe management flaws that led to a cascade of delays and $1 billion
in cost overruns. Auditors found an alarming lack
of decision-making by City Hall, which led to major technical missteps,
the abandonment of a critical objective, and poor vendor performance.
Audit: Management of 911 Call Center Project Was Ineffective:
In
May 2012, Comptroller Liu released another audit that found that
Hewlett Packard, the contractor selected to streamline the 911 call
system, did not meet City qualifications for the job and had monitored
the work so poorly that it had overbilled taxpayers
by as much as $163 million.
Audit: Mismanagement of 911 Upgrade Picked Taxpayers’ Pockets:
In
January 2013, Comptroller Liu warned Mayor Bloomberg that his
office may reject future contracts with Hewlett Packard if it fails to
pay back the $163 million it owes the City.
Release: City Should Boycott Hewlett Packard:
In
May 2013, Comptroller Liu wrote to Mayor Bloomberg urging him to
recoup the $59 million in cost overruns that the Administration
estimated arose from Verizon’s failure to meet its contractual
obligations, and offered to work with him to renegotiate the
contract so that the City would not have to rely on Verizon technicians
to operate this critical public-safety system.
Liu letter to Mayor Bloomberg on Verizon E911 contract:
In
June 2013, in response to the recent crashes in the E911 system
that have call-center workers relying on pen and paper to relay
information to dispatchers, Comptroller Liu commenced a new audit of the
system. That audit will examine whether the Mayor’s
Office of Citywide Emergency Communications is successfully monitoring
the integration and implementation of the Computer Aided Dispatch System
into the ECTP.
Audit letter to
Mayor’s Office of Citywide Emergency Communications:
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