Huge DeKalb schools project altered, aiding spouse

Pope’s husband, Anthony “Tony” Pope, said his wife did not make the changes to give him work. But he acknowledged that her actions helped him financially.

“You’re doggone right it benefited me,” Tony Pope said.

The revelation about Pat Pope’s actions in this project is the latest in a series of AJC articles about the official and her involvement in the construction projects under investigation.

Pope, who headed the school district’s construction program until the criminal probe intensified last fall, solicited bids in fall 2007 for work on the massive Mountain Industrial Center complex, records show.

At the time, Tony Pope had teamed up with a construction company to compete for the job of renovating the complex, which includes two schools and other facilities near Tucker.

But that company decided not to pursue the project, leaving Tony Pope without a business partner to bid on the work.

Had Pat Pope moved forward with the project as it was, it would have gone to one of the other contractor-architect teams in the running.

Instead, she broke the project in two and the district gave a fraction of it to one of the original bidders, without advertising the changes. The much larger portion of the work was put out to bid a month later.

By that time, Tony Pope had teamed up with Nix-Fowler Constructors. That company won the contract, which now stands at $21.3 million, through a competitive bid process. Tony Pope’s portion so far is $1,075,718, according to financial documents obtained from Nix-Fowler.

The project is expected to be finished by spring.

The district attorney’s office is probing whether Pat Pope, who has been reassigned from her position as chief operating officer, broke the law by allegedly steering contracts to her husband’s architectural firm and two other construction companies where she has connections. Investigators won’t discuss the case.

Pat Pope declined to comment when reached by phone Tuesday. Arora issued a brief statement Wednesday by e-mail on Pope’s behalf, denying any misconduct.

“It appears that allegations and half-truths will continue to be made against Ms. Pope until the District Attorney’s investigation is complete,” Arora wrote. “The rules and regulations surrounding school construction are complex. These issues cannot be properly rebutted in the context of a newspaper article.”

In a phone interview this month, Tony Pope said his wife split the Mountain Industrial project because the bids for the work exceeded the budget for the project and because some of the work — the small part that was awarded first — needed to be done before the next school year.

The school district would not confirm or deny his assertions.

Documents obtained by the AJC show that first portion of the project did need to be finished before the start of the 2008-2009 school year.

However, records also show that dividing the project did not bring it under the school system’s initial budget for the work. The total price tag for the two parts exceeded that budget by more than $1 million.

Money also didn’t appear to be an issue later when Nix-Fowler’s contract grew by almost $4 million. The price tag grew, in large part, because the school district decided to move numerous administrative offices to Mountain Industrial.

Tony Pope insists that he and Nix-Fowler got the work because they were the best team for the job, not because of his relationship with Pat Pope, from whom he has been separated since October.

“It was an open, fair competition of numbers and presentation of capabilities,” Tony Pope said. “And Pat wasn’t part of that.”

Nix-Fowler co-founder Carey Fowler declined to comment for this story. The company does not appear to be involved in the investigation.

It appears that Tony Pope should not have been working on the project, regardless. Schools Superintendent Crawford Lewis has said that he told Pat Pope that Tony Pope could not work as a subcontractor for the project or any others he wasn’t already working on before his wife joined the school system.

Tony Pope disputes that. He contends that he was given written permission by the school district to be a subcontractor on the project. He gave the AJC a copy of an April 2008 letter he said granted him the permission.

In it, an attorney for the school district, J. Stanley Hawkins, wrote to Lewis that he did not consider the arrangement a conflict of interest.

“I told Pat that so long as there was no actual conflict of interest — and I did not see one here — the situation did not present any legal problem at all,” Hawkins wrote. “To the extent that any issue is presented, it is one of perception.”

But Hawkins left the ultimate decision up to the school board. It’s unclear whether the board resolved the matter.

Dodging Georgia law?

By not advertising the changes to the project’s first phase, Pope might have skirted a Georgia law that states advertisements for such projects must be detailed enough to let the public know “the extent and character of the work to be done.”

The first project that was awarded did not resemble the “complete design and construction” of Mountain Industrial described in the advertised request for bids.

Bidding laws require public disclosure “to ensure the public that their money is being spent wisely, that we’re not letting public officials reward people close to them,” said Bill Bozarth, executive director of the ethics watchdog group Common Cause Georgia.

Lynn Jackson, an official with the state Department of Education, which reviews and approves all school construction projects across the state, said she could not address the Mountain Industrial project. But, speaking generally, she said county school districts cannot make major changes to construction projects without advertising them.

“If I were a school system, I would want to be more cautious than that [not advertising significant changes],” Jackson said.

The law is not a criminal statute and does not carry a punishment if violated.

Soliciting bids

The school district solicited bids for the Mountain Industrial project in September 2007.

At the time, the project involved the complete renovation of about 250,000 square feet of the existing building, county documents show.

At a pre-bid meeting on Sept. 11, 2007, interested bidders were told there would be “one contractor that will do the entire project,” records show.

For the next month, the project appeared to remain on track. But the construction company that had aligned itself with Tony Pope, Merit Construction, backed out because “the size of the project was too much for what we wanted to do at the time,” Merit Vice President Mark Schilling said.

County documents show that three companies offered bids on Oct. 18, 2007, but the school system would not provide the amount of those bids, citing the district attorney’s seizure of its documents. The three companies were Hogan Construction, C.D. Moody Construction and Malone Construction.

Five days later, Pope asked the companies to provide separate price estimates for a small portion of the renovation, a 26,000-square-foot area, documents show.

Hogan Construction was notified that it won the reduced award in November 2007. The district signed the contract, ultimately worth $3.8 million, on Jan. 12, 2008.

Pat Pope’s department began advertising for the larger portion of the renovation on Feb. 14.

Only Hogan and Nix-Fowler submitted bids for the work.

In its written proposal, Hogan wrote that it was “ideally suited” for the job because it was working on the first phase, documents show.

“Knowledge gained over five months of exploratory and design work will jump start the process ensuring a timely completion,” the company wrote.

But Hogan did not win the project. Nix-Fowler, which offered the lower bid, was awarded the contract.

Timeline

Sept. 6, 2007: The first advertisement for the Mountain Industrial Center renovation appears in The Champion newspaper.

Sept. 11, 2007: The district holds its first meeting with contractors and architects.

Oct. 4, 2007: The district holds a second meeting with contractors and architects.

Oct. 4 - Oct. 18, 2007: Merit backs out of the process.

Oct. 18, 2007: Companies — Hogan, C.D. Moody and Malone — offer bids.

Oct. 23, 2007: Pat Pope asks the companies to offer bids for a much smaller portion without advertising the changes.

Jan. 12, 2008: The school district signs a contract with the winning bidder, Hogan Construction Group, to do the small portion.

Feb. 14, 2008: The district advertises the remaining portion of the project.

March 19, 2008: Hogan and Nix-Fowler Constructors submit bids.

May 11, 2008: The district signs a contract with Nix-Fowler to build the rest of the project.

How we got the story

While reporting on the criminal investigation involving Pat Pope, the AJC learned she made critical changes to a high-dollar project around the same time that circumstances rendered her husband unable to bid on the project. The newspaper obtained many school district documents and interviewed numerous people involved, including Tony Pope. The AJC also obtained documents from two construction companies through an Open Records Act request, because both received public funds on the project.