PITTSBURGH — Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen Zappala sent a strongly-worded letter to the Matrix Consulting Group, ordering them to preserve all documents and records related to the controversial police staffing study that cost taxpayers $180,000.
Zappala sent the letter today after Matrix accused him of misrepresenting the facts and making false statements.
Matrix, in an email to Zappala Monday night, said the city approached them about the study, and said they didn’t do any billable work on the study until the no-bid contract was signed.
Zappala, in the letter sent Tuesday, accused Matrix of failing to disclose that they were already performing crucial aspects of the study prior to signing the contract.
“Matrix’s omissions helped undermine the entire no-bid process; tainting the Matrix reports and assisting City administration in wasting the $180,000 of taxpayers’ money,” wrote Zappala, who suggested the city may have abused the no-bid contract process.
Earle: Was there an abuse of the no-bid contract?
Gainey: No, there was no abuse of it, not at all.
Gainey defended his administration’s no-bid contract with Matrix and said the District Attorney should be worried about other more pressing cases.
“One is let’s get done with the whole Jim Rogers situation, second the Airbnb. There are different issues he could be attacking right now to bring peace to this city instead of talking about violence. If he wants to have that conversation, how we improve this city, I’m on board, until then this conversation is moot,” said Gainey, referencing the tasing death of Jim Rogers and the deadly easter Sunday Airbnb mass shooting on the North Side. In both cases, no one has ever been charged.
The DA raised questions about the Matrix study last month after the report suggested the city had more than enough patrol officers, even though the ranks continue to decline and officers are routinely mandated to work overtime to cover shifts.
The study said the city could eliminate 188 patrol officers, and assign them to other duties.
Zappala has said the conclusions reached in the report just don’t add up.
Zappala demanded records and documents pertaining to the police staffing study from the Mayor’s office last month, after receiving complaints about the study.
He received those documents and said yesterday that he found some irregularities.
He said Matrix was actually performing work two months before the no-bid contract process began.
He said the city indicated that Matrix was the only company that could perform the study, but the administration never provided any documentation supporting that.
Matrix claims the reference to the March 2022 start date in the report was a typo and that no billable work was done until the contract was signed in July.
He also said Matrix, “repeatedly and intentionally misrepresented its qualifications” It’s unclear what Zappala was eluding to.
That comment drew an angry response from Matrix.
“We would like to know what you are referring to, as we take pride in the integrity and the truthfulness of our qualifications and experience. It is disappointing that no attempt was made to contact us prior to this letter being written. We eagerly away the opportunity to discuss this matter further and refute these claims. Ultimately, we expect a retraction of these claims,” wrote Richard Brady, of Matrix Consulting.
Zappala did not request the documents from Matrix but ordered them not to destroy any of the paperwork related to the police staffing study.
“If you have any further claimed typos, please feel free to bring them to my attention,” wrote Zappala.
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