Brandon Johnson has proven himself quite the “leader.” He bad-mouthed ShotSpotter, calling it racist and other disparaging remarks. And when the contract ran out, he ASSUMED he could just extend it. Initially ShotSpotter’s parent company said, “thanks, but no thanks.”
But with the City of Chicago’s checkbook in hand, Birdbrain’s crack team of negotiators hammered out a deal to extend services through the summer murder season and, of course, the Democratic National Committee convention. Because all eyes will be on Chicago and yet another orgy of violence won’t look well for JB Pritzker or Birdbrain.
Turns out, ShotSpotter agreed to an extension, thanks to millions of dollars. $8.6 million to be exact.
The only problem is that the agreement didn’t go through the normal bidding process.
Whoops.
Bradon’s gonna need more Xanax, stat!
From the Sun-Times:
The nine-month, $8.6 million contract extension that Mayor Brandon Johnson frantically hammered out with ShotSpotter to give the Chicago Police Department time to transition away from the gunshot detection technology just might be illegal, sources have told the Chicago Sun-Times.
That’s because the original contract with ShotSpotter’s parent company, SoundThinking, was never competitively bid or subject to the city’s normal procurement process, which requires what’s called a “request for proposals.”
Because of the way the contract was secured, the city isn’t allowed to extend it at less favorable terms. Instead, the 2018 contract that got the ball rolling on the first of $57.5 million in payments to the company was a “reference” contract, piggybacked onto a similar agreement in Louisville, Kentucky.