Metropolis Comptroller candidate Justin Brannan is trying to goal public corruption.
Photograph by Lloyd Mitchell
Brooklyn Metropolis Council Member Justin Brannan is pitching a plan to crack down on corruption in metropolis authorities as a part of his comptroller bid, following the a number of scandals that engulfed Mayor Eric Adams’ administration, New York News has realized.
Brannan’s plan — shared completely with New York News forward of its launch — guarantees to start publishing a listing of “bad actor” metropolis contractors, strengthen oversight of the town’s contracting course of to root out conflicts of curiosity, and broaden the workplace’s investigative energy over metropolis companies.
“I’ve always believed that public service is a public trust, and our government should work for the people and not the well-connected. I have zero tolerance for corruption,” Brannan mentioned in an interview. “I think fighting for tougher ethics laws and real accountability and transparency at every level of government is extremely important for the comptroller, whose main responsibility is ensuring that people’s hard-earned tax dollars are spent efficiently and wisely.”
Brannan is in a heated race towards Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine within the June 24 main.
New York Metropolis Corridor.Photograph by Ethan Stark-Miller
Corruption watchlist, contracting
Underneath the plan, Brannan desires to roll out a watchlist for the 25 worst actors amongst metropolis contractors and distributors. Based on Brannan’s marketing campaign, corporations might make the listing for having excellent fines owed to metropolis or state companies, violating labor legal guidelines, opening corruption or fraud investigations, failing to ship on metropolis contracts, and having conflicts of curiosity or unethical enterprise practices.
Brannan mentioned the town ought to not do enterprise with distributors that find yourself on the listing and as an alternative prioritize corporations which have historically been shut out of its contracting course of, reminiscent of Minority and Ladies Owned Enterprise Enterprises (MWBEs).
“There’s a lot of vendors and companies out there that if people found out that the city was doing business with them, they would be appalled,” Brannan mentioned. “I think knowledge is power in these situations, and people need to know that we’re only doing business with vendors and companies that are above board.”
The council member pointed to the controversial medical companies firm turned migrant shelter supplier, DocGo, getting awarded profitable contracts beneath Mayor Adams, whereas extra community-level nonprofits had been handed over.
Brannan’s plan additionally floats reforming the town’s contracting course of by requiring distributors to reveal marketing campaign contributions and subcontractors, in addition to establishing an “independent contract review board.” He mentioned beefing up oversight and transparency within the metropolis contracting course of might assist forestall among the alleged corruption schemes that landed a number of former Adams administration officers beneath federal investigation.
“We saw a bunch of resignations from City Hall that were around issues like this, where there were friends and family who were getting sweetheart deals,” Brannan mentioned.
Different elements of Brannan’s plan name for passing laws to broaden the comptroller’s workplace’s investigative energy. Presently, the workplace has audit and subpoena energy.
Brannan desires to arrange a “public integrity unit” that might perform unbiased corruption investigations into metropolis companies. He additionally goals to create a confidential whistleblower system for metropolis staff and contractors to report corruption and conduct annual “anti-corruption audits” of metropolis companies with the largest budgets and contract masses.
