Marc Schiff, Part II

Indicted courthouse architect has ties to Albuquerque's future firefighter academy, a project one city councilor calls a "money pit."

ALBUQUERQUE -- The Albuquerque Fire Department Academy under construction on the West Side shares some similarities to the Albuquerque Balloon Park and Museum and the scandal-plagued Metropolitan Court complex in Downtown Albuquerque. All three have exceeded their budgets -- some by millions of dollars -- and all three were projects awarded to indicted local architect Marc Schiff.

 

Last year, the U.S. Attorney's Office unveiled a 26-count indictment that detailed a fraud and kickback scheme in which $4.2 million of taxpayer money was skimmed off and paid to former politicians and other state officials for construction of the $83 million Metro courthouse. Schiff was one of at least eight people involved in the scheme. He has pleaded guilty to conspiracy and mail fraud charges. A trial in U.S. District Court is pending.

 

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Eileen Welsome unraveled a connection between Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chavez and Schiff last week in a report commissioned by the Center for Civic Policy. The details of a nearly two-month investigation show how Schiff was awarded a contract for half a million dollars in 1995 to build the balloon complex and how it was inflated to $6.7 million over the next 12 years.

 

Chavez has not replied to requests made by the New Mexico Independent or to Welsome for comment on her published report. However, the city has denied that Schiff's contract as the architect for the fire academy had anything to do with its cost increases. Fire Chief Robert Ortega said Schiff was taken off the project in 2006 after the FBI began investigating Schiff's role in the courthouse scandal.

 

Albuquerque City Councilor Michael Cadigan said he made the connecton between the fire academy and the balloon projects recently when he sought answers to why the fire academy has nearly tripled in cost since it was first proposed, and why it has taken nearly five years to complete. He said Monday the academy is a "money pit" that's costing taxpayers millions more than its original price tag.

 

"Frankly, the fire academy reminded me of the balloon park and museum projects," he said. "There was this irrational exuberance for this project, and there was no real public safety need for it, that I could see. It had a life of its own. It seemed to be getting priority (by city officials) over other public safety projects and getting more and more money. It followed the same pattern as the balloon projects."

 

According to Welsome's investigation, the balloon complex's additional costs were "approved in seven supplemental agreements, an unprecedented 87 additional service agreements, and several additional service agreements in which (Schiff's former architectural firm Design Collaborative Southwest) received money as a subcontractor to the engineering firm, Bohannan-Houston. Rich Braun, the president of DCSW's successor firm, Studio Southwest Architects, said only $1.3 million of the $6.7 million actually went to DCSW. "The rest went to subcontractors."

 

Welsome said that more than $60 million has been appropriated for the balloon park and museum, which is a "three to four-fold increase over what Schiff's firm predicted the balloon complex would cost in 1995."

 

Cadigan said the fire academy's cost increases got him thinking about its architect. He asked city council staff to look at the contracts, and was told that Schiff was listed as the original architect. He said the documents also showed that Schiff had been taken off the project after the investigation into the courthouse began. The firm with the new contract, Studio Southwest.

 

Ortega said that while Schiff was the original architect, he hasn't managed any part of the fire academy, and he said that Studio Southwest has severed ties with Schiff.

 

Construction began last November, and the project is scheduled to be finished this December. Ortega said the city's planning department is responsible for awarding the contract through a sealed-bid process and that Schiff went through the proper procedures.

 

Ortega differed with Cadigan on the initial cost of the project. Ortega said that when his department decided it needed to renovate the fire academy in 2004, the plan was to spread out the funding for the project over three years. He said there was $505,000 to start the project in 2006, $3.5 million to add to it in 2007 and another $3.5 million in 2008, bringing the total cost of construction of the new fire academy and renovations to the existing facility to $7.8 million.

 

Another $1.3 million is being requested from the city in the 2009 fiscal year to accomodate "move-in costs and furniture, training equipment, separate from the construction costs," Ortega said.

 

However, the 2003 legislation authorizing the vote for the Public Safety Tax indicates (in attachment A) that AFD was going to use $1 million for the first year of the tax and $1.3 million in the second year. Funds actually budgeted and spent increased dramatically from the $2.3 million to $7.8 million.

 

"The extra $1.3 million is in the proposed FY/09 budget, which would put the cost of the fire academy at $9.1 million," Cadigan said. "It's pretty clear from the legislation that what was being proposed for the academy was only $2.3 million and that it was for two years, not three."

 

Ortega said costs have increased because of construction materials also have increased in price. He said the academy is dated and is not "up to par," and renovations to the existing academy on 114th Street and building a state-of-the-art emergency operations center are needed in order for Albuquerque to have a top-notch fire academy. He said budget cuts 12 years ago left the fire academy without adequate training space or even showers.

 

The new facility will include a building so that cadets can "train indoors when weather is inclement," Ortega said. "The new academy will have a Joint Information Center in partnership with Sandia Labs. It will give us a place for all the news organizations, TV, radio and others to gather in the event of an emergency and have all the information disseminated at one central location."

 

Cadigan said he doesn't think spending millions of dollars on an indoor training space makes much sense "since Albuquerque has so few bad-weather days to begin with." He also questioned why the current command center AFD uses near the central dispatch isn't adequate.

 

"It just makes me wonder if this is the best use of tax dollars and if truly this improves public safety at any measurable level," Cadigan said.

 

Editor's note: The Center for Civic Policy is a financial supporter of the New Mexico Independent.

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