By: Massachusetts State Auditor Diana DiZoglio
9-24
Dear Valley Patriot readers,
Recently, my office released a performance audit report of the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority (MCCA), reviewing the period from January 1, 2021, to December 31, 2022. We also looked back through January 1, 2018, to review certain issues raised to our office regarding MCCA’s procurement and employee complaint practices.
A public authority of the Commonwealth, the MCCA is responsible for providing event space and business to tourists, residents, and its employees. It operates high-profile venues you may be familiar with – the Hynes Convention Center, Boston Common Parking Garage, Boston Convention & Exhibition Center, Lawn on D, its parking facility (Lot on D), and MassMutual Center in Springfield.
Our audit uncovered some disturbing and unlawful practices. We found that, under prior leadership, the MCCA cherry-picked when it was convenient or not convenient to follow state law and internal policies around public records, procurement and settlement agreements. The MCCA was unable to prove that it obtained sufficient quotes for several purchases, did not follow procurement policies for a media contract worth more than $100,000 and executed vendor contracts without board approval.
Deeply troubling and unacceptable is the fact that prior leadership violated the law in executing a $1.2 million non-disclosure agreement, concealing allegations of racial discrimination.
The state’s Supplier Diversity Office provides benchmarks for agencies that participate in the Supplier Diversity Program. Agencies are expected to meet or exceed spending as follows: 8% for minority-owned businesses, 14% for women-owned businesses, and 3% for veteran-owned businesses. MCCA missed the benchmark by a significant dollar figure and failed to effectively promote diversity in their contract procurement.
When holding large events, such as the ones in MCCA-owned and operated spaces, safety should be a top priority. Our audit found serious gaps in the safety procedures for events that the MCCA coordinates. Many event clients were not provided with a pre-event survey, which meant the MCCA did not collect important information relevant to the safety plan needed for events.
New leadership has since been brought in to manage the MCCA since our audit first began, with most individuals joining the organization outside of our audit period. Our office is grateful to MCCA Interim Executive Director Gloria Cordes Larson for working alongside our audit team to immediately begin addressing these and other very concerning issues identified in the report. We will continue to work to shine a light on areas for improvement through our post-audit review, which will be conducted in roughly six months.
If you have any questions about the audit report we just released, or any other audit report produced by my office, please always feel free to reach out at auditor@massauditor.gov.
Yours in service, Diana ◊