In the first public accounting of Gregorio Palomino’s performance on his federal food relief contract, a U.S. Department of Agriculture official said the San Antonio event planner fell 250,000 food boxes short of what he was supposed to deliver.
“They supplied about 500,000 boxes. They did not supply the entire amount of their contract,” Bruce Summers, administrator of the Agricultural Marketing Service, told members of a House Agriculture subcommittee last week in Washington.
Palomino’s $39 million contract with the USDA called for him to deliver 750,000 boxes of produce, protein and dairy to food banks and other nonprofits in the southwestern U.S. under the Farmers to Families Food Box program. The boxes are intended for families in need, to ease hunger during the coronavirus pandemic.
It’s unclear how the federal agency determined that Palomino’s company, CRE8AD8, delivered “about 500,000 boxes.” The USDA wouldn’t provide details about which entities received how many boxes, not just for CRE8AD8 but for other companies involved in the program, raising the ire of U.S. Rep. Marcia L. Fudge, D-Ohio, chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Nutrition, Oversight and Department Operations.
“We have no idea what you are doing. Nor do you, because you can’t answer the questions,” she said in her closing remarks. “Who is getting the food?
“Are you paying somebody to really give it to people that should have it? We have none of those answers.”
Palomino told the San Antonio Express-News in an email Friday that his company has delivered “hundreds of thousands of boxes to food banks, hundreds of truckloads of food and millions of pounds of food to nonprofits.”
“CRE8AD8 LLC served dozens of underserved regions within our contract and over 80 nonprofits and food banks in the SW Region,” he said in the email.
But he provided no specifics about which nonprofits received boxes or how many went to each one.
Through bills of lading, other records and interviews, the Express-News has verified that Palomino’s company delivered at least 182,000 boxes, most of them — 147,000 — to food banks affiliated with Feeding America in seven states. The rest went to other nonprofits, churches and faith-based groups.
At last week’s hearing, Greg Ibach, the USDA’s undersecretary for marketing and regulatory programs, said CRE8AD8 was paid only “for the amount of boxes they actually delivered.”
The company will not collect the full $39 million, Ibach said, adding: “The fact that they maybe came up a little bit short on their numbers, they were not rewarded financially for not delivering those boxes.”
Palomino’s contract was one of the largest awarded to the nearly 200 companies chosen by the USDA in the first round of the food box program, which ran from May 15 through June 30. The USDA was criticized for selecting several companies with little demonstrated experience with large-scale food distribution, food banks and suppliers in a process that bypassed bids from more established companies in the food industry.
At the hearing, USDA officials defended the companies they chose.
“Every firm, including that one (CRE8AD8), provided information in their proposal that showed that they had been involved in the distribution of food and had the ability to go out and procure food, pack it in boxes and deliver it to nonprofit organizations,” said the Agricultural Marketing Service’s Summers, whose wing of the USDA oversees the program.
But the focus of CRE8AD8 (pronounced “create a date”) was planning weddings and corporate events. Palomino lacked a Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act license when he landed the USDA contract May 8. The license is required to buy or sell more than 2,000 pounds of fresh or frozen fruits and vegetables in any given day, according to the USDA website.
Palomino applied for the license and received one from the USDA in a matter of days. He made his first delivery May 28: 235 boxes to the San Antonio Food Bank, according to a bill of lading from the food bank.
Ibach told the congressional committee that after the department “became aware of the concern that surfaced among Congress, among the media, about that contractor” the USDA sent officials to CRE8AD8’s facilities to speak “with that contractor.”
“We re-verified that they were capable of trying to fulfill their contract,” Ibach said.
Fudge was blunt in her criticism of the USDA’s selection process after the two-hour hearing.
“Because USDA has rushed this program out the door, there is very little quality control with regard to who gets these contracts and who is qualified to actually meet the need,” Fudge said. “Tens of millions of dollars have gone to inexperienced contractors that still haven’t delivered anywhere near what they’ve promised.
“As one food bank executive explained today, if USDA had gone through established and capable channels, this problem could have been avoided. This is a humanitarian effort, not a gravy train.”
The USDA said in late June that it would grant extensions into the second round of the food box program, which covers July and August, to “well-performing contractors.”
CRE8AD8 didn’t get an extension, a USDA spokesperson said.
In his email Friday, Palomino said, “We’ve exhausted our award to the maximum capability and were not up for an extension.”
All deliveries under the contract had to be completed by June 30, the USDA spokesperson said.
Eric Cooper, San Antonio Food Bank CEO, also testified at the House hearing. While he praised the USDA for initiating the program, which is continuing at least through December, he said he’d like to see accountability improved.
“Working with a local contractor here in San Antonio, we struggled to meet basic things like labeling. Some of the protein boxes, which should have been a diverse variety of protein, contained five 5-pound boxes of peppered chicken labeled for commercial use,” he said. “We had to reach out to the manufacturer, which was in California, to get heating instructions to include in all the boxes we distributed.”
He said equity also needs to be addressed.
“Equity between those that got food and those that didn’t,” Cooper said. “Some areas got a lot of produce, some got zero. Some got dairy, some got none. Having no distribution plan with just a thought to work with any 501(c)3 (nonprofit) seemed a little willy-nilly.”
torsborn@express-news.net
Tom Orsborn covers sports news in the San Antonio and Bexar County area. To read more from Tom, become a subscriber. torsborn@express-news.net | Twitter: @tom_orsborn
"Short" - Google News
July 25, 2020 at 04:00PM
https://ift.tt/39pMn6G
USDA testimony shows San Antonio’s CRE8AD8 came up a third short on its contract to deliver food boxes for the needy - San Antonio Express-News
"Short" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2QJPxcA
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "USDA testimony shows San Antonio’s CRE8AD8 came up a third short on its contract to deliver food boxes for the needy - San Antonio Express-News"
Post a Comment