It seems like every other comment against Rick Jackson gives as a key reason his “no-bid” contract. These comments cannot go unchallenged because what they imply is the opposite of the truth.
On March 30, 2017, a massive fire caused a section of I-85 to collapse. Within hours, Govenor Nathan Deal declared a state of emergency in Fulton County.
He immediately by-passed all normal procurement rules and awarded a no-bid contract to C.W. Matthews. The contracting company immediately went to work literally around the clock.
On May 12, 2017, just 43 days after the collapse, I-85 was reopened to normal traffic. In addition to the bid price, Matthews received incentive payments of up to $3 million dollars for completing the job ahead of schedule.
Had Governor Deal not declared a state of emergency and awarded a no-bid contract, it would have been months or even years to go through normal procurement channels.
In February 2020, following a funeral in Albany, Georgia, a strange new virus ripped through Southwest Georgia taking lives faster than anything known to man in recent history. It was not just Southwest Georgia, it was moving world wide.
Hospitals were inundated and drowning in the human catastrophe. There were no beds and exhausted staff were working around the clock to try to keep up. They were especially hurting for nurses, respiratory therapists, and other clinical staff.
Governor Brian Kemp declared a state of emergency. He used the same emergency powers to cut through cumbersome procurement rules to meet an emergency need.
Jackson Healthcare is a Georgia based company with a nation-wide footprint. It had the recruiting infrastructure to move quickly. Governor Kemp called Rick Jackson and asked him for help.
Rick Jackson had a nationwide demand that he could have turned toward other places and made more money. Instead he told Governor Kemp that he would help and he directed his company to focus on Georgia first.
You remember the Covid crisis don’t you? You know someone who spent days in the hospital. Perhaps you even lost a loved one to this horrible plague. It would have been catastrophically worse had Rick Jackson not turned to focus his efforts on Georgia.
There is an exact parallel with the 2017 I-85 bridge collapse and the 2020 Covid crisis.
– There was a catastrophic incident – Interstate bridge collapse and public health pandemic.
– The Governor declared a state of emergency –
– The Governor waived normal procurement rules to meet the state of emergency.
– C.W. Matthews delivered an open bridge in record time
– Rick Jackson deployed thousands of clinicians statewide.
– The people of Georgia won
It is incorrect to present the Covid state of emergency as somehow “cheating” Georgians. Rick Jackson could have cut Georgians short, and turned his massive recruiting engine toward other areas – but he didn’t. He put Georgia first.
Can you honestly say that if you had been in the Governor’s shoes or Rick Jackson’s shoes you would have done anything differently? I didn’t think so because to do anything differently would be to sell Georgians short and ultimately live with the fact that more lives were lost because you didn’t act with a laser beam focus on Georgia, like Rick Jackson did.
Let’s be clear on this particular issue. There is a time when “no-bid” contracts are the only right choice to make. This is one of them.
There. I set the record straight on no-bid contracts.
