Portland Public Schools on Tuesday publicly released the final version of an external bond audit that found the district bond program at heightened risk of fraud, in part thanks to its contracting with Procedeo, a Texas-based construction firm. But top district officials took issue with the audit’s scope and findings, with PPS’s senior chief of operations disputing “the tenor of the report’s narrative and frequent implication of impropriety.”
What’s more, the district signaled it does not intend to follow key recommendations by the audit, including renegotiating the size and cost of the Procedeo contract. PPS’s contracting with Procedeo is being considered for criminal investigation by the Oregon Department of Justice, as WW first reported.
The bond audit itself remains largely unchanged from the draft audit WW first reported in September. Auditors found risks of bias and favoritism as the district selected Procedeo for a $61.5 million contract to perform bond program management services, including the timely delivery of three high school construction projects and the Grice-Adair Center. They warned that because PPS had followed Procedeo’s recommendation to terminate much of its internal staff who’d previously overseen bond projects, it was at risk of losing institutional knowledge and had grown overreliant on the external firm. And they found that PPS had, compared to market rate, overspent on the Procedeo contract…