One of the motions before the Antioch City Council on Tuesday, August 9th is a consulting services agreement with Karate Consulting.

Lonnie Karste worked for the city’s recreation department back in the early ’90s, but later was transferred to the Antioch Police Department despite heated protests by the unions. He was transferred once again, this time to Prewett Park, before his retirement, after which he incorporated a consulting business.

City Manager Jim Jakel, who has contract authority for contracts under $50,000, has contracted with Mr. Karste to handle a couple of smaller projects such as emergency operations planning and exercises ($10,800) and a study of redevelopment records and transactions ($8,600).

Tuesday night the City Manager will be requesting council to approve a $48,000 agreement with Mr. Karste to oversee the Measure WW funds for three projects over the next year: lighting at the Lone Tree Golf Course, Prewett Aquatics Facility renovation and synthetic turf fields at the Antioch Community Park. Cost for the projects is approximately $3 million with up to 20% allowed for administrative costs.

I disagree with City Attorney Lynn Nerland’s statement to council that “With no staff resources available with the qualifications to handle this project management assignment, the City would be looking to contract it out to someone if not Karste Consulting.” In fact, I find the statement highly objectionable.

The Community Development Director and staff, with involvement from the six members of the Parks and Recreation Commission, should be overseeing these projects. Also why was Mr. Karste doing a study of redevelopment records and transactions? The city has a finance department to do that.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 9th, 2011 at 5:04 pm and is filed under Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.