Auditor Puts Brakes On Oracle Contract, Cites $500,000 Mistake
By Brian Maass
DENVER (CBS4)- Denver City Auditor Tim O'Brien today refused to sign a $6.1 million contract for services from Oracle until the contract numbers match the amount approved by Denver City Council.
"If anyone wonders whether I actually read the 3,500 contracts I sign each year, here's their answer," said O'Brien.
He said there was a $500,000 discrepancy between the $6.1 million recently approved by city council and the software and license expenditure numbers in the contract which actually add up to $5.6 million.
O'Brien said he will sign the contract once he receives an amendment from the city reducing the contract amount by $500,000. City council recently approved the new Oracle contract 11-0. Later on Tuesday, a spokesman for O'Brien said he later signed the contract after receiving assurances the half million dollar math discrepancy was being straightened out..
Jeffrey Garcia, the auditor's director of contracts and accountability said,"...we in government have a sacred responsibility to treat the people's money as carefully as we do our own. The $500,000 that was incorrectly encumbered by the Oracle contract could pay for a lot of services that residents depend on."
The City of Denver had paid Oracle about $1 million a year in 2015 and 2016, but the new five-year contract calls for a much larger payment in 2017: $3.9 million this year this year, followed by a $919,000 payment in 2018 and lesser payments in the last three years of the contract.
CBS4 contacted the director of Denver Technology Services, Scott Cardenas, requesting information about the contract error.
Jenny Schiavone, a spokesperson for Denver Technology Services, acknowledged the SNAFU saying, "Technology Services will initiate a contract amendment to make the maximum contract amount consistent with the detailed amount."
CBS4 Investigator Brian Maass has been with the station more than 30 years uncovering waste, fraud and corruption. Follow him on Twitter @Briancbs4.
