Health Department Forms Folder 0038, 2000-2001

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

AUG-23-2000 17:5? MAYOR'S OFF. OF CONTRACTS 1 212 788 0049 P.0820

time delivering this important service. It is our opinion that the "firewall" affords the Department and the City the necessary protections.

In addition, the vendor initiated a number of remedial measures to satisfy the Department's contractual requirements and in furtherance of their affirmative obligations to prove to the Department that it is a responsible vendor. Attached to this RFA are copies of a May 12, 2000 letter from Zayas & Oquendo, P.C., and June 21, 2000 letter from Rita Prats.

The following conditions have been inserted into the contract between the Department and the vendor to memorialize the "firewall": the vendor is governed by a board of directors, which is responsible for the conduct and affairs of the vendor; the Executive Director's role is to manage the day-to-day affairs of the vendor; each of the vendor's contracts has a program director who is directly responsible for the implementation of the contract both programmatically and focally; the vendor has a chief financial officer who is separately responsible for reviewing and monitoring each of the vendor's contracts fiscally by working with each contract program director; the Executive Director has never been directly involved in the preparation of any fiscal or programmatic reports in connection with any of the vendor's contracts; all fiscal or programmatic reports have been and will be prepared by the program director and the vendor's chief financial officer; for the Department's contract, all reports - fiscal and programmatic - will be reviewed, approved and signed by Rita Prats, the vendor's Board's Chairperson; the vendor's Executive Director will not review, approve or sign any reports - fiscal or programmatic - created by the vendor under this contract; the vendor created a new position of Associate Director/General Counsel who is now responsible for reviewing all contracts and legal documents, including Vendex Questionnaires prior to signature by the Executive Director or the Board of Directors; the General Counsel will also submit monthly reports directly to the Board of Directors on all legal matters, including contracts that have been signed or are pending signature; the Executive Director will have no contact with the City or the Department on this contract, and the Board of Director's Chairperson will represent the vendor on all issues to the Department-

This contractor has received 34 contracts from various city agencies since 1990, for Head Starr, Day Care, Elderly, HIV and other services, and all Performance evaluations on the City's Vendex System are positive, ranging from Satisfactory to Excellent. Therefore, in light of the Council's 35 years of experience providing services in the East Harlem community, satisfactory ratings on prior city contracts, and the remedial measures taken by the Council in response to the recent actions of the CEO, the vendor has demonstrated its responsibility to manage this contract. K:\CMS\Contdocs\ACTUALS\00IP053\cm-rfa.wpd

NYC-WTC 000138190