New whistleblower claims fraud at Census
When a senior✱ Census Bureau employee found what he believed to be fraud in the granting🌼 of a $2 million annual contract to the University of Maryland, he reported it to his immediate superiors.
He says nothing happened.
So he went t꧂o the head of Census, then to the bureau’s comptroller, then to its chief financial officer.
Still, nothing.
Next was the Commerce Departmen🦩t’s Inspector General, because that’s𒆙 the agency that monitors Census. After that, he wrote to the Office of Special Counsel, to his senator, Ben Cardin (D-Md.), and to the White House and the FBI.
Then he started getting harassed.
Staff was re💧moved from his command, and he suddenly got a bad performance 🃏review and was suspended.
So he went to the Commerce Department’s Office of Civil Rights, then to the Equal Employm♏ent Opportꦏunity Commission and the Merit System Protection Board.
That all began in 2010. A couple weeks ago, that employee 🐻— Ivan Irizarry, theꦚ lead scientist at Census’ Demographic Statistical Methods Division — came to me out of frustration.
The UofM contract, which Irizarry says was never put up for competitive bid, was🐻 only one of the deals he questioned. But it was the most costly.
And it is the most interesting, because Robert Groves, who was picked by President Obama in 2009 to head Census, was a professor at Maryland when th𒊎e contrac𒊎t was inked.
In fact, Groves taug♏ht in the same division — the Department of Joint Program for Survey Method — that was working for Census.
And th𒐪e deal continued after Groves was tapped by Obama. Irizarry says he always fel🎐t that was one reason he was getting nowhere.
Groves left Census in 2012 and now teaches at Georgetown. He didn’t respond to an email I sent. I briefly spoke with a UofM spokeswoman, but she didn’t call me back after I told her the nature of my inquiry. The Census IG’s office wouldn’t𒊎 comment.
“I get the impression that 🐻this was like Monopoly money to them.༒ They could do whatever they wanted with it,” said Irizarry during one of our many phone conversations.
The explanation to him was that the University of Maryland had the only department that could do this type of work. But Irizarry — who, as Census’ contractor offices technical🍷 representative, or COTR, on the deal — was in charge of monitoring payouts and knew there were others. “I had to investigate if there were any other universities that could provide comparable services.”
I began investigating Census more than a year ago when a source in the Philadelphia region told me that one data colle🦋ctor had been caught making up interviews and that others were doing the same. Up until now, I’ve been focusin🅠g on allegations from whistleblowers in four of the six Census regions that economic data was falsified.
The matter of falsification has also been looked into — sloppily, in my opinion — by Commerce’s Office of the Inspector General, which nevertheless recommended radical changes in data collection procedures. And it i⭕s still being looked into — much more diligently — by the House Com🅘mittee on Oversight and Government Reform and the Joint Economic Committee of Congress.
🅷But there was another matter, which I’ve ignored until now, that my original source alerted me to: financial misdoings on contracts, expenses and maybe even🌳 pension funds.
“I told the Inspector General’s office about questionable checks coming out of the Philadelphia regional office’s payroll,” said this original source, who still does not want to be identified publicly but is known to investigators. She🔥 put this matter into a report given to the IG’s office in 2010 and 2011 but she never heard anything more, although investigators did ask for additional information in 2013.
Nothing about missing money was mentioned in the Commerce IG report that was ♊released last May and focused on data falsificat💛ion.
Each of the six Census regions — Philadelphia, New York, Atlanta, Los Angel♓es, Chicago and Denver — has its own budget, which totals millions of dollars a year. There is lღittle oversight on expenses, I’m told.
Irizarry said he tried despera𝓡tely to oversee the contracts that came out of the Census Bureau’s technical division — which was connected to headquarters and not any of the six regions. “I 💝immediately started running into anomalies,” he said.
For instance, “they werಌe asking me in 2010 to ratify an amendment to the Maryland contract. It was an unauthorized procurement in the amount of $75,000 that was allegedly made in 2009,” Irizarry said. “When I asked for documentation, there was none,” he said, adding that they eventually came up with some paperwork.
But since $75,000 was an amount that would automatical𒅌ly have to be approved by Commerce, the amendment was reℱduced by $25,000 to bypass that process, Irizarry claims.“To avoid scrutiny from the Department of Commerce attorneys,” says Irizarry.
Another time, in the summer of 2010, Irizarry said, the univer﷽sity tried to change the terms of another contract, adding $80,000 to the cost. “So I put a stop to the project until I could get assurances that we had sufficient funds,” Irizarry said.
UofM came back with the correct amount. “They said they had made a mistake,” says Iriza♒rry.
What did UofM do to earn♒ that $2 million a year? It added to its curriculum short and semester-long courses in survey methodology, the kind of knowledge useful to Census work🌠ers when collecting and analyzing data.
But, Irizarry said, anyone from Census who took the courses had to pay tuition. And that tuition was reimbursed by the government. So the go♓vernment was getting dinged twice — first when it paid to create the courses and then for tuition. “We were double-paying,” Irizarry said.
And there were other things. “I was also getting invoices that included amounts for🐼 $20,000 and $40,000 that were under the vague ‘other’ category,” said Irizarry. “When I asked the un꧟iversity for clarification, it took them two or three months to give me answers.”
Remember, these were additional charges over and above t🐟he 🐷original $2 million-a-year deal.
Maryland’s explanation? “That ‘other’ included compensation for inꦡterns. It took them months to figure that out,” Irizarry.
“And, in my opinion, that’s not what the contract was for,” said Irizarry. “I𒀰 couldn’t certify an invoice that included a $35,000 payment under the ‘other’ category. I didn’t know what ‘other’ was. I didn’t know what I was paying for.”
Irizarry said he was about to start an audit but was “getting a lot of pressure from the program manager at Censu🌱s,” who wanted to pay ♉them quickly.
Another contract was for $600,000 with a company called Evolve🤪r. “In reality we are talking abo🌠ut a literature review and a summary of a literature review. In my opinion it was just absurd to pay over $600,000 for the project as it was described,” Irizarry said.
And, Irizarry claims, when he looked into it, he discovered that Census was paying for the contract with funds earmarked for other purposes. And then the company “wanted $25,000 more for a fin✱al report. That’s ridiculous!”
“When I told my supervisor how ꦿridiculous this was, he immediately had me replaced on the project,” Irizarry said. “It looked comparable to a thesis. I don’t know that a thesis is worth $600,000.”
Should🧸 we even bother with a questionable $2 million payment when Census has a budget of billions a year? Well, yes, we should, because we don’t know how many otheဣr unnecessary or non-bond contracts Census’ headquarters and regional offices have signed that were either unnecessary or, at the very least, not put up for competitive bidding.
Equally as importa꧟nt as the money is the way Census has been treating whistleblowers — who are supposed to be protected under federal law.
I suggest that the House Oversight Committee carefully audit Census headquarters and all its regions.𓄧 Irizarry would be happy to talk with investigators.
Is $2 million a year a significant🎃 amount t🍒o Census? Well, in 2011 the bureau — then run by Groves — underwent a massive restructuring that included cutting its regions from 12 to six.
The purpose was to save a projected $15 million to $18 million a year — although, I’m told, those amounts were never achieved. So, yes again, a $2 million contract is a significant amount of money if C💞ensus was willing to disrupt thousands of workers’ lives for a relatively mod🌞est savings of $15 million to $18 million.
Why did Irizarry talk with me and allow me to use his name🌞, even though there may be illegal reprisals?
“Integrity to me has always been very important. The only way we can effect change is that, little by little, individuals like me be brave enough to do something,” he s🦄aid. “Everyone always complains about the system. If you think soౠmething is wrong or illegal, you need to tell someone.”
“And if they don’t 🍒listen, you tell som𒅌eone else. And if nobody is listening, you stand in the town square and you tell everyone,” he said.
If you work at Census — or any other government agency — and want to get something off your chest, my email is John.Crudele@btc365-futebol.com. If it’s urgent, call me at (𒈔212) 930-8276. I’ll look into as many🐬 issues as I can.