John Tedesco

Red tape stalls stimulus project in San Antonio

We’ve been checking how stimulus funds are being spent in Bexar County, and one of the interesting things we’ve learned is how money for some projects still hasn’t been spent, more than a year after the Recovery Act became law.

Last month I met Peter Zanoni, assistant city manager for the city of San Antonio who’s in charge of the city’s stimulus projects. He and his staff said the stimulus is great for San Antonio but they were also open about some of the difficulties they faced. At one point, Zanoni showed me a chart detailing how the city had been awarded $118 million in stimulus money. But as of April, the city had only spent about a tenth of that — $12 million.

“So you’re probably saying, ‘Jeez, what are you guys doing? That’s pretty weak,’” Zanoni quipped.

The problem is that officials want to spend the money quickly, but they also want to make sure it’s spent appropriately. There’s a ton of federal oversight — audits, reviews, paperwork — that the city must deal with.

I ended up focusing on an example of a project that was mired in red tape. The city had plans for two fire stations that were “shovel ready” and had received $7.3 million in stimulus grants. The money came from FEMA — the Federal Emergency Management Agency. I got a tip that the project was taking forever and the contractor on the job, Bartlett Cocke, even had to lay off a few employees.

Not quite what the stimulus program was supposed to be accomplishing.

The tip turned out to be true — I interviewed Kirk Kistner at Bartlett Cocke who confirmed it. I also asked for any e-mails from the city that discussed the delays with the fire stations and other stimulus projects. It’s important in these kinds of stories to track down pertinent documents. Tad Wille, budget program analysis manager for the city who somehow keeps track of all the paperwork tied to stimulus projects, was very helpful in compiling a pile of e-mails discussing the delays.

In one message, a deputy fire chief updated his bosses about the federal regulations that were slowing down the project: “FEMA stated to me that ‘shovel ready’ was not a term in their lexicon,” the chief wrote. The e-mails helped lay out the timeline of events and revealed concerns expressed privately by city officials.

One thing I wanted to know is whether other fire departments were experiencing similar delays with these fire station grants. Federal data allowed us to answer that question.

Recipients of stimulus dollars file spending reports, and that data is posted online at Recovery.gov, the official website of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board. In the data, each type of grant is identified by a specific code. So you can filter the data by that code to find who has received similar grants.

That’s what I did for the fire station grants. It allowed me to write the following graphs in my story about the fire stations:

According to the most recent spending reports posted online by the Recovery Board, 118 fire departments in the United States had been awarded nearly $200 million in grant money to build new stations. But four of five recipients reported the projects have yet to start, and few jobs have been created.

The reasons for the delays aren’t always FEMA’s fault. In the town of Edgewater, Fla., the station still is being designed, so a detailed environmental assessment required by FEMA didn’t interfere with construction, Fire Captain Jill Danigel said.

“That process did take us many, many months,” Danigel said. “If we were shovel ready, that would have held us up.”

In Valley Hill, N.C., Fire Chief Tim Garren said he’s in the “same boat” as the San Antonio Fire Department.

“We’re as shovel ready as can be,” said Garren, whose department received a $640,000 grant in September 2009 to build a new station. Garren still is waiting for the environmental assessment at the site to be approved.

“I don’t want to fuss because it’s going to be free money, and it’s greatly needed,” Garren said. “But it’s still frustrating.”

We plan to run more stories about local stimulus projects and their impact in Bexar County. I’ve been bookmarking interesting websites about the stimulus and sharing them online through Diigo, feel free to check them out and offer recommendations or tips.

Constitution of the Mexican Mafia in Texas

Express-News Reporter Guillermo Contreras is covering a federal trial involving the Mexican Mafia, and he wrote about a fascinating court exhibit: The constitution of the Mexican Mafia in Texas.

This document was posted on mySA.com today, and it’s all about setting a strong social structure for the gang:

There are few words that actually describe the criminal activities of the Mexican Mafia. Here they are:

“We shall deal in drugs, contract killings, prostitution, large scale robbery, gambling, weapons, and in everything imaginable.”

On March 26, City Hall reporter Josh Baugh got an adrenaline-pumping tip: FBI agents had seized files at the office of Fernando De León, a city official who reviewed permits for real estate development in San Antonio.

The tip sparked a frantic series of phone calls that afternoon as Josh and I tried to figure out what was going on. Authorities said they couldn’t discuss many details — there was still an active investigation, and De León hadn’t been charged with a crime. It was an understandable response, but we had to tell readers what was happening at a city department funded by their tax dollars and permit fees.

Trying to find answers in a story like this is like working on a jigsaw puzzle, only you have to go out and interview people and dig up records to find the missing pieces. And even then, you’re only going to see part of the picture. But after a lot of work, here’s the gist of what we know today:

There’s certainly far more to this story, but it’s a start. If you’re digging into a murky topic like this for a blog or news organization, here are a few tips that can help you find the missing pieces of the puzzle:

(Photo credit: liza31337)

When City Hall reporter Josh Baugh and I worked on this story about fired city official Fernando De León, Josh found a nice online tool to help us connect the dots.

LucidChart lets you create flow charts and organizational trees that you can share with your colleagues and publish when you’re done. Here’s the chart we made for our most recent story.

It’s a quick and easy tool featured on Lifehacker. Our chart helped me explain to graphic artist Mike Fisher what our story was about visually, which resulted in a simplified version that ran in the paper.

Thankfully, our chart wasn’t as complicated as this bad boy.

City hall reporter Josh Baugh and I learned a few more scraps of information about fired city employee Fernando De León; the permit company owned by his sister; and possible reasons why the FBI and police are investigating them.

First, some background:

On March 26 — a lazy, Friday afternoon in the newsroom — Josh got a tip that FBI agents were at the city’s “One Stop” center. The tipster said the FBI was carting out files from Fernando De León office, and leading him away in handcuffs.

The One Stop center is a spacious city building that feels more like a trendy art museum than a staid government building. It’s the home of the city’s Planning and Development Services Department. Developers and builders visit the One Stop center to apply for permits to develop land, construct new buildings, and renovate existing structures. De León, an assistant director at Development Services, was one of many employees who reviewed those plans.

I know De León. The last time I saw him was a month or so earlier, when I visited his colleague’s office for a story about the cracked retaining wall at the Hills of Rivermist. In the newsroom, I was walking by Josh’s desk and saw De León’s picture on the computer. “What’s up with Fernando?” I asked. Josh told me about the tip.

I think my exact words at that point were: “Holy shit.”

I offered to help find out what was going on and called Development Services. A receptionist answered. I asked for De León. He was unavailable. I asked for his boss, Roderick Sanchez. He was unavailable, too. I said I heard there were guys in suits over there and asked what they were doing. She blurted “Oh, my God,” and said she couldn’t talk about it.

I got my stuff and started running out to my car to head to Development Services. Josh caught up with me and said it was too late — the FBI had been there earlier that day and had left. So now we had some catching up to do to find out what had happened. It was about 5 p.m., and we had a few hours to go before deadline.
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With all the mind-numbing stories about shootings and car accidents that usually glut local TV news broadcasts, it was refreshing to watch this gripping, commercial-free, documentary-style story by KSAT about the homeless.

Broadcast in December 2005, the story was an effort by anchor Steve Spriester to chronicle the face of homelessness in San Antonio. Express-News columnist Veronica Flores-Paniagua recently found out the KSAT story had sparked the idea for Haven for Hope, San Antonio’s new and controversial campus for the homeless:

Homelessness isn’t a sexy topic. But Spriester’s bosses recognized the public service potential and decided to air a half-hour show, sans commercials, during primetime — a Tuesday night in December 2005.

Even with that kind of professional support, it would still be a roll of the dice that the documentary, “The Other Side of San Antonio,” would engage the viewing public. Would people watch? Would it make a difference?

With Haven for Hope’s dedication ceremony Wednesday, the answers are a resounding yes.

The right people — namely, the right man, local business titan Bill Greehey — saw it. And the documentary gave Greehey’s philanthropy an intense, inspired direction. As the fundraising point man for the $100 million public-private Haven venture, Greehey regularly credits the show as the launching pad for his participation.

I’d loyally watch TV news if there were more stories like this and fewer stories about car wrecks. At a time when news organizations are facing cutbacks and looking for ways to win back the trust of their audience, here’s a shining example of the kind of story that ought to be the norm — not the exception.

Last week, FBI agents and white-collar crime police detectives questioned Fernando De León, a city official in San Antonio who oversaw the permitting process for real estate development.

We published a story today with more details:

Federal authorities subpoenaed records last year at Pape-Dawson Engineers Inc., the largest engineering firm in San Antonio, as part of an investigation of permitting practices at the city’s Planning and Development Services department.

Two sources familiar with the inquiry said Pape-Dawson Engineers is not the target of the investigation. FBI agents appear to be focused on Rapid Permit Services Inc., a small company that Pape-Dawson had hired in the past to file development plans with the city.

Records and interviews show Rapid Permit Services is owned by Rebeca De León Lopez, who is the sister of Fernando De León, an assistant director of land development at the city who was questioned Friday by the FBI.

Federal agents and white-collar crime police detectives seized De León’s computer and files from his office Friday at the Development Services “One Stop” Center at 1901 S. Alamo St. That same day, City Manager Sheryl Sculley placed De León on administrative leave.

Asked about the FBI inquiry, engineer Gene Dawson Jr., a well-known figure in the real estate industry, responded by e-mail to the San Antonio Express-News, stating: “Pape-Dawson confirms that we did meet with the FBI last summer, but due to the ongoing investigation, we have no further comment.”

You can check out this pdf of the incorporation papers of Rapid Permit Services, which were filed about 10 months before De León was promoted to assistant director at the city in July 2006. The city also has a flow chart on its Web page showing the employees who worked for De León and their duties.

Here’s a Dipity time line of the main events we know so far, in a case that raises questions about the oversight of real estate development in a rapidly growing city:

For longtime observers of local politics, the terms “City Hall” and “FBI” conjure memories of a bribery investigation that snared former city councilmen Enrique Martin and John Sanders.

On Friday, FBI agents and San Antonio white-collar crime detectives showed up at the city’s Planning and Development Services department and seized a computer and files belonging to Fernando De León, an assistant director in charge of issuing land development permits. Authorities later questioned De León for several hours that same day at police headquarters downtown. De León was not arrested and he was released after the interview.

WOAI’s Brian Collister reported in February that San Antonio police were investigating building inspectors in the same city department. The inspectors check residential and commercial structures, and inspect things like electrical systems and plumbing. If the building isn’t up to code, the inspector is supposed to tag the flaw and the owner is supposed to fix it. The city is investigating whether inspectors took money to sign off on work that wasn’t up to city code.

Friday’s development added a new wrinkle to this story — it was the first sign that the FBI is investigating the city department. And De León oversaw land development, not building inspections. His name is tied to hundreds, if not thousands, of development plans that govern things like lot densities of subdivisions and tree preservation requirements. De León held an important position in a city that is grappling with the growing pains of urban sprawl. Here’s the city’s description of his responsibilities:

The Land Development Division is involved with the review and approval process of Master Development Plans (MDPs), Plats, Tree Preservation, Infrastructure, Traffic Impact Analysis (TIAs), and Zoning. The Construction and the Environmental Inspectors assist the Division in the field. The Land Development Division serves as staff to the Planning Commission, Zoning Commission and Board of Adjustments.

District Attorney Susan Reed said investigators are examining “irregularities in the permitting process” that De León oversaw.

I last bumped into De León in February when I was at Development Services covering the retaining wall collapse at the Hills of Rivermist. He’s a friendly, soft-spoken guy.

How did the FBI and San Antonio police team up? It appears they were initially conducting separate investigations of Development Services:

Officials said city and federal investigators “crossed paths” during two separate investigations of the department. The city got involved in October, when the Office of Municipal Integrity received a complaint about the four building inspectors.

When that office determined it was a criminal matter, it turned the case over to the city manager’s office, which in turn handed it over to the Police Department, officials said.

Meanwhile, federal authorities were quietly conducting their own inquiry. …

“We did cross paths,” [Police Chief William] McManus said. “We partnered up.”

Here’s a time line of events in the investigation that have been made public so far. I’ll add more events as we learn more.

There’s still more news in the story of the retaining wall collapse at the Hills of Rivermist — builder Centex Homes declined to meet with residents today.

If you want to know more about the background of this story, I made this timeline of the major events related to the retaining wall collapse.

Nearly two months after a retaining wall split open at the Hills of Rivermist in San Antonio, Centex Homes submitted plans to the city for a new wall that is reinforced with concrete piers and will cost at least $4 million:

Centex Homes is hoping the third time’s the charm. This week it produced a preliminary design concept for a new retaining wall to replace one that collapsed in January in a Northwest Side neighborhood — which in 2007 replaced one that was not “performing to expectations.”

But homeowners say they are weary after two months of stress and uncertainty and are still on the fence about whether to trust that this latest fix will last.

The builder and developer of Rivermist and The Hills of Rivermist told the city it plans a wall 1,700 feet long. The new wall will be built in front of the existing retaining wall, and will include reinforced concrete piers driven 10 to 30 feet into the ground and reinforced concrete panels between the piers, Centex said in a news release.

The company will give the city formal engineering plans by April 30. It expects construction to take four to six months and cost $4 million to $5 million.

The original structure was a gravity wall, which relied on the heavy weight of stone and mortar to remain stable. But after the collapse, city officials inspected the wall and claimed it lacked a solid core of mortar, which makes the wall lighter — and unstable.