Hahn Wants Private Contract for Managing County Vehicles Voided

A federal investigation of alleged contract fraud by Holmes & Narver Corp. has prompted Los Angeles County Supervisor Kenneth Hahn to call for cancellation of an $80-million vehicle fleet management pact that the board awarded to the firm earlier this week.

Holmes & Narver, an architecture, engineering and construction management firm based in Orange, was accused by a Government Accounting Office investigator Wednesday of possible criminal activity in the management of a $250-million service contract at Redstone Arsenal, the Army’s missile headquarters in Huntsville, Ala.

The county contract awarded Tuesday by supervisors turned over to Holmes & Narver the management and maintenance of the bulk of the county’s vehicle fleet.

Employee Unions

The contract was awarded on a 3-2 vote, with Hahn and Supervisor Ed Edelman opposing it. Also opposed to the contract were county public employee unions. The contract will affect 192 county employees who must decide whether to quit the county and become Holmes & Narver employees or, in many cases, retire or accept transfers to lower-paying county jobs in other departments.

Officials of the union local that represents many of the employees began a lobbying campaign Thursday, using the Redstone allegations to try to persuade supervisors to cancel the contract. A Hahn aide said Thursday that the supervisor believes the board should reconsider its decision in light of the Army investigation.

Hahn “read the story this morning about the overbilling, especially the lube and oil overcharges, and that’s almost exactly what we’re contracting with them for,” Hahn aide Dan Wolf said. “This is something we should check out.”

Review Asked

Supervisor Mike Antonovich, according to an aide, has asked County Administrative Officer Pete Dixon to review the Redstone allegations and the statement Holmes & Narver sent to supervisors Thursday. Other county supervisors could not be reached for comment.

The GAO alleged several instances of inflated billing under the contract, including a 262% overcharge for lubrication and oil changes for the Army base’s vehicle fleet.

Holmes and Narver is joint contractor at Redstone with Morrison-Knudsen Corp. of Boise, Ida. Both firms are being investigated by the Army Criminal Investigations Division, GAO investigator David C. Williams said Wednesday in testimony before a House subcommittee.

Holmes & Narver officials Wednesday had declined to comment on the charges until they had reviewed Williams’ testimony. Company officials could not be reached for comment Thursday, but the firm sent a statement to county supervisors, maintaining that the allegations of criminal activity involved subcontractors at Redstone and that there has been no evidence of any wrongdoing by Holmes & Narver or its partner.