Scheme costs Pinellas schools hundreds of thousands of dollars

Two former Pinellas County Schools workers are accused of organizing a bid-rigging scheme for mulching contracts worth at least $860,000 that returned more than $200,000 to one of them.

Authorities arrested the men, along with two contractors, on state racketeering charges this morning.

Alan L. Smith, 48, of New Port Richey, and Paul Jensen, 51, of St. Petersburg, were both longtime maintenance employees who worked their way up the ranks to manage a multimillion-dollar playground renovation project as shop planners for the school district.

The other suspects, Robert Sciarra, 25, of Largo, and Heath Jensen, 26, of St. Petersburg, both own lawn service companies that investigators say profited from the bid-rigging scheme. Jensen is Paul Jensen's son.

"The whole thing was not done correctly. It could have cost the taxpayers more, and that's just plain wrong," said schools Superintendant Julie Janssen.

The bid-rigging came to light after Janssen asked for a routine review of operations at the Walter Pownall Service Center last spring, in an effort to cut unnecessary spending.

"She simply wanted the operation to be scrutinized to make sure money was being spent responsibly," said school district General Counsel Jim Robinson.

That review revealed an unusual number of mulching contracts awarded to the same contractor, Sciarra Lawn Care, between January 2006 and March 2009.

"When you see the same companies receiving the jobs every time, red flags go up," said Janssen.

Here's how school investigators say the scheme worked:

Smith and Jensen arranged for phony bids from Heath Jenson and other contractors that submitted higher bids than Sciarra, ensuring he would get the contracts to provide mulch for dozens of renovated playgrounds at Pinellas schools. The school district's competitive bidding process requires at least three bids for any contract of more than $6,000.

Those contracts were part of what Smith described in his resignation letter as a $4.5-million project. Work was done at least 46 schools, most of them elementaries.

The school district paid Sciarra Lawn Care a total of more than $860,000, according to documents from the school board investigation.

Sciarra, in turn, paid more than $420,000 to Jensen Lawn Care, which paid Paul Jensen more than $212,000 over a three-year period, according to those records. Heath Jensen's company did at least some of the work.

It's not clear how much, if anything, went to Smith for his role in the scheme.

None of the men arrested could be reached for comment. Only Sciarra had bailed out of the Pinellas County Jail by late this afternoon, and he couldn't be reached at his home.

Jensen and Smith were set to be fired after a nine-month school board investigation for violating the district's competitive bidding process, but they retired in early January before the school board could take action. Jenson had worked for the district since 1987, Smith since 1996.

In his resignation letter, Smith said he was resigning "with sadness and regret" and offered a number of suggestions "so that other valued employees do not become discharged unfairly."

Smith said the playground renovations should never have been assigned to the maintenance department and that he hadn't receive sufficient training for "this enormous project."

"There was never any specific training or assistance provided by management to me in the applicable bidding process required to complete this project," Smith wrote.

In his letter, Smith characterized his actions as justified, while conceding he did not follow proper procedures. He said he had steered the contracts to Sciarra because he was a reliable contractor.

But school district officials question the quality of the work that was done.

Robinson said the suspects could not provide evidence they hired licensed pesticide contractors to debug the playgrounds, as required by law, prior to spreading the mulch.

Last month, Smith and Jensen were allowed to retire with pension benefits and clean records. School officials didn't pursue further action because Smith and Jensen were gone, and they believed a pending criminal investigation would result in further consequences.

"Do we want to go out there and really publicize that this is wrong?" Janssen said. "I believe sometimes that's the best way to go, but we don't want to cost taxpayers more money."

The school district is exploring options to collect some of the money it paid, Robinson said.

"One possibility is the recovery of retirement contributions," he said.