IOLANI - The Royal Hawk: Vol VI No. 662 Part 3 - The Railroaded Rail from John Bond,Tom Berg; Other Projects, etc.

FTA, HART Expensive ART SCAM, Concrete Columns, Few Cheap Coloring Books For Hawaiian Culture

John Bond

Jul 26 (9 days ago)

to Pilipo, Pono, Michael, Aulii, Michelle, Lucienne, Lucy, Lucy, Jo-Lin, Alika, Prince, Lancelot, Association, Hanalei, KAHEA:, Ikaika, Kingdom, Sierra, Hui, Hawaii, Hawaii, editor, Tearson, Kalai, Poka

ART AWARDS – Handing Out Millions With No Stations. Where is the

artwork? Rail not running until at least 2026-27. Why all these art

commissions now?

Large very lucrative HART Rail Art Contracts going out almost entirely for very

abstract art and sculpture as HART and City awaits State Legislature to bail

out the never ending unaccountable spending.

See attached List of who got Big Bucks From HART Rail Insiders.

At a HART Consulting Party meeting on Tuesday, HART had realized and

admitted they were not keeping up with the FTA Programmatic Agreement

(that few people know about and which the “news media” has virtually never

reported on) and will need to ask for MORE MONEY. After shoveling out

MILLIONS of art contracts, HART realizes they have “no budget” for fulfilling

their FTA PA agreement to fully record and present the history of the areas

around the rail stations as per FTA Grant Agreement to get the $1.5 Billion.

(Another City breach of contract.)

The HART plan- maybe some very cheap coloring books to “honor”

Hawaiian culture.

Hawaiian art culture almost entirely omitted. No sense of local place, just art

abstractions purchased for millions. HART insider millions art rail party.

The overall budget for the Art-In-Transit Program was $5 Million. Submittals

reviewed by a transit art committee but no one knows who they are.

No accountability at HART.

HART also has a “History Committee” to spend $500,000 but no one knows

who they are and what they have spent the money on. No accountability at HART.

Is the very expensive artwork selected just to amuse Asian rail tourists?

The budget for each piece ranges from $125,000 to $450,000 based on the

artwork and the station, officials have admitted. The city has already spent $694,000

for art in the Farrington Station group, which includes the West Loch, Leeward

Community College and Waipahu Transit Center stations.

However these stations have not yet been built and rail is not expected to even by

running until 2016-27. Why is the money being spent NOW? Because there is NO

ACCOUNTABILITY and the State Legislature and City Council will GIVE THEM ALL

THE MONEY THEY WANT, no questions asked.

"This art program is an excellent example of building rail better," Caldwell

said. "This provides an opportunity for our local artists to showcase their

talent and their passion for Hawaii. This will truly be a canvas of creativity

for generations to come" – Caldwell HART news release (2012?)

The city “may offer” the public an opportunity to participate in the artist selection,

but in fact this never happened. Selections were made by HART rail insiders.

Friends of Caldwell.

http://www.honolulu.gov/rep/site/csd/news2013/transitartfaqs.pdf

The Art-In-Transit funds come from two sources: the Full Funding Grant Agreement

signed December 19, 2012 between HART and the Federal Transit Administration

(FTA) and revenue from the State of Hawaii’s general excise and use tax surcharge.

Federal guidelines call for transit projects to provide between 0.5 percent and 5

percent for a project called Art in Transit.

The FTA defines rail station "art" broadly, allowing works ranging from

free-standing sculpture to wall pieces to functional elements such as

lighting, seating or railings. Presumably then elevators, escalators and

toilets could be classified as “artwork” by FTA.

The city said in a news release years ago that it plans to provide 1 percent of

the estimated cost of the stations, or about $5 million for artwork. However project

and station costs have skyrocketed since then and it would be assumed that now

the figure would be $10 million for artwork, or eventually -$15-20 million for artwork

once the final projectcosts are known, which no one knows at this point what

anything will cost to "finish" rail.

"HART's art program will reflect the rich tapestry of Hawaii's culture,

tradition and histories.”

Lisa Yoshihara, HART's Transit Arts Program administrator, said in a written

statement that the city "wants the art to reflect a ‘sense of place' that recognizes

Hawaii's multicultural landscape and reflects the community, or ahupua’a in

which the station resides."

However it is very hard to see how highly paid abstract artists without

any public input will result in this happening.

The HART meeting on Tuesday asked the few attendees (since the public was

never invited) to decide maybe on coloring books for destroying Pueo, Ewa

farmland, burial sites, which HART denies exist. In fact the only history HART

admits to are downtown buildings.

Empty stations if ever built to have expensive abstract artwork for mostly

Asian rail tourists, concrete pylons, a few coloring, maybe 500 coloring

books "honor" Hawaiian culture.

Why does HART have apparently ZERO BUDGET for local cultural history

stories but millions for expensive abstract artwork which has no place to

go and will be eventually very expensive to guard 24-7, 24 hours a day in

the massively expensive electricity intensive “palace” rail stations?

Where there any specific guidelines for purchasing artwork? No, it was all up

to the whim of a few HART rail insiders as to who got the huge abstract art

station contracts.

Attachments area

Click here

************

The goods on HART's ROBBINS Re: Our Rail Bid was rigged not disqualified. Use the correct verbage!

Tom Berg

Aug 1 (3 days ago)

to Rick, Ben, andy.robbins, Carroll, Honolulutransit, Honolulutraffic, Cindy, Jeff, Mike, Rick, Panos, Panos, Randy, Randall, John, editor, Andrew, Denby, Bob, Civilbeat, Chad

Send to all- if worthy- can you consider please - to email this to all who have interests in this new EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR FOR HART - thanks.

Here are the facts-

Watch this first-

Ansaldo vs Bombardier Honolulu Rail Part One

1. The City's Chief Procurement Officer was so sloppy- so careless- that on various pages within the document- scope of project requisites- it gave conflicting data- info- for example, on one page, it said no cap on third party liabilities- but on the next page, it says there is a cap!

2. When Bombardier tried to notify the Chief Procurement Officer of their blunders- the City said screw you and never returned their calls!!!!!

3. Then- when Bombardier made the challenge for justice and fair play- appealed- sued- the first thing the City did was file a motion to prevent Bombardier from bringing forth the evidence regarding the conflicting language on page xyz versus page abc----get it?

- I WAS THE ONLY COUNCILMEMBER WHO voted NO to pay for the City lawyers to argue against Bombardier- and me -I was for arguing for saving $234 million!!!! I was the only councilmember to vote NO! VOTE NO TO FUNDING CITY LAWYERS WHO ARE CHEATS AND UNETHICAL AND have no moral compass, no desire to act in good faith. All other 8 councilmembers gave the City lawyers hundreds of millions of dollars to cheat this company, and rob Robbins out of fair play and justice. Yet, the people keep voting for these 8 councilmembers wherever they go.

*******AND HERE IS THE KICKER- hold on to your shorts!

The City won the case based upon a legal maneuver that barred, prevented, prohibited, denied all evidence regarding the sloppy conflicting language the City had advanced and written down in the actual document- so when the Hearings Officer and subsequent court(s)/judges heard the case, Bombardier was never allowed to show to any Hearings Officer, Judge, Court--- barred from showing their evidence!!!!!!!!

***** Get this--- that on page X it said NO CAP ON THIRD PARTY LIABILITIES- then on the next page- turn it over- and it says the very opposite - THAT THERE IS A CAP ON THIRD PARTY LIABILITIES......the court case /contested hearing from day one- day one- was rigged!!!! You gotta watch the videos to get it- watch it three four times to sink in how fricking corrupt our town is- I mean corrupt.

So all Bombardier was asking throughout the procurement process was- for clarification- and the City never fricking gave it to them!!!!!!!

$234 million flushed down the toilet- AND ONLY BERG CARED to expose it- how does that turn your fancy all you Berg haters!

You got to watch these videos- you will piss in your pants- crap in your underwear, vomit in disgust at what Robbins had to go through/endure in this town- this is classic Robbins- I love this guy- he is the real deal- I would vote for him to be Governor if given the chance- he told the truth - and you got to get these videos disseminated to all so they know- we have finally- an ally who will fight for truth, justice, and fair play- watch and learn and be proud Robbins is going to be at the helm- thank God.

Get out the popcorn- bring in the whole family- this is the feature film that should be watched by every taxpayer and voter - be ready for the moment of pissing in your pants-

Honolulu Rail Car Ansaldo Rip Off

The City and County of Honolulu had the opportunity to cancel its award with Ansaldo when it was discovered that...

Honolulu Rail Car Contract a Disgrace

The City and County of Honolulu had the opportunity to save $234 million on the contract to build and maintain t...

I have Tim Sakahara's coverage on this too- watch short ten second video clip- classic! Just gp tp link- and wait for video- then down load video- takes two seconds- ten second TV clip- Team Berg Video Clip

Team Berg Video Clip

Some great coverage on this found no where else!!!!

RAIL AWARD GONE BAD; GUN RANGE; WAIANAE PLAN; TAXES

This has the TV coverage preserved!!

BERG SHAKING THINGS UP/BEES ARE SWARMING

On Tuesday, August 1, 2017, 8:48:54 AM HST, Jerry Lam <drjlam@aol.com> wrote:

-----Original Message-----
From: msmatson
To: 'John Bond
Sent: Tue, Aug 1, 2017 8:02 am
Subject: RE: Andrew Robbins to HART: Our Rail Bid would have won if not Disqualified

How much clearer can it get that the Rail Bid Was Rigged ????? To determine the vast extent of “city rigging,” the city should be forensically audited and sued in the public interest by the State Attorney General. And with the forthcoming special session for rail funding, the State Legislature may also need to be audited.

Subject: Andrew Robbins to HART: Our Rail Bid would have won if not Disqualified

2011 Andrew Robbins to HART: Our Rail Bid would have won if not Disqualified

http://www.hawaiifreepress.com/ArticlesMain/tabid/56/ID/4996/Bombardier-to-HART-Our-Rail-Bid-would-have-won-if-not-Disqualified.as

Full Text of August 31 Letter sent to HART Board members by Bombardier Transportation VP Andrew Robbins

I am taking what some may view as an unusual step by communicating directly with you despite an active appeal with the Circuit Court and a Protest to the Federal Transit Administration. Given the importance of your mission as Board members on a project that will change the face of Honolulu for 100 years or more, it is imperative that you be presented with facts and information that I believe have not been made available to you to-date.

Bombardier also believes strongly in the Honolulu High-Capacity Transit Corridor rail project and has no objective to block it in any way. Our actions should prove this having been an Offeror in 1991, having kept an active interest ever since, having fully re-engaged with the City more than 6 years ago, having encouraged City officials to become educated and understand global best practices and having offered cost-saving and passenger enhancements to City staff and consultants as they made their way through a long, complicated and arduous procurement process.

Bombardier qualified for the Priority Offeror List and was invited to submit a proposal for this project. We responded to the RFP and 47 addenda and cooperated through numerous changes in plan and due dates. We submitted not one, but three proposals having committed experienced staff time, resources, subcontractor and supplier resources to this multi-million dollar effort to offer the City and its taxpayers the best possible proposal for the heart of the system – the Core Systems, as well as for long-term and ongoing Operations & Maintenance. I believe City and HART staff would acknowledge that our efforts were serious, meaningful and valuable.

DISQUALIFICATION OF BOMBARDIER’S PROPOSAL

We are aware that some would characterize our actions of appealing our disqualification as “sour grapes” or the actions of “sore losers.” In fact, we did not “lose” this award. Our proposal was disqualified and not even considered. When we examined the public file documents shortly after Mayor Carlisle made the award announcement on March 21, 2011, we were shocked to discover that the disqualification of our proposal swept away what would have been the winning bid. Although the City did not finish the scoring of our proposal, according to the City’s own evaluation of pricing in its life cycle cost analysis, and the scoring it did do on the technical & management aspects of the proposal, Bombardier had the lowest total price and highest score. It took the media to expose this truth despite a misleading City press release and improper redacting of documents. A summary of the pricing and the scoring is attached for your convenience. Also attached is the City’s own “Life Cycle Cost”, or more appropriately, “Net Present Value” analysis of all three bids, which clearly shows that Bombardier offered the lowest total price proposal and best value by a significant margin.

What is even more shocking is the City’s handling of our disqualification. Bombardier included one sentence in all three of its proposals attempting to clarify a poorly drafted provision in the RFP. The provision involved the City adding language to create an overall cap on liability but then leaving in language that circumvented the cap rendering it meaningless. While the City pointed out other areas of our proposal that could be strengthened over this time period, the City never specifically indicated to Bombardier through all this time that the objectionable sentence would be viewed as creating a conditional proposal and would be used, just days prior to awarding the Contract, as a reason to completely disqualify Bombardier and in the process, to sweep aside the lowest total price and highest scoring technical and management proposal.

APPEALS WITH THE CITY AND DCCA

Bombardier protested this improper disqualification to the Chief Procurement Officer of the City. We subsequently received a denial of our Protest, in reality by the same team that disqualified our proposal in the first place, leaving us no choice but to appeal to the State Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs (DCCA).

Unfortunately, at DCCA, the Hearings Officer granted the City its summary motion to dismiss and we never were afforded the opportunity for a fair hearing where we could present evidence and testimony of the actions of the City that would have shown that the City acted improperly and contrary to the Hawaii Procurement code. In addition, the Hearings Officer relied on a clever twisting of the facts by the City’s outside counsel when he conceived a theory that Bombardier “conditioned” its proposal to gain a price advantage on its competition. There was zero actual evidence presented to the Hearings Officer to justify such a theory. In fact, Bombardier‘s price would not have changed one bit at that time or now. The proof that Bombardier did not play this game is sitting in an Escrow bid file that is still in escrow today at a local Title company and can be accessed to prove that the Hearings Officer got this wrong.

APPEAL TO FTA AND CIRCUIT COURT

It is for these reasons that we were compelled to file further appeals with the FTA and in Circuit Court. Bombardier has an obligation to its shareholders, its suppliers and subcontractors and especially to its employees to see this through. The utmost concern for HART Board members is the interests of the taxpayers. It defies logic that the City would, at the 11th hour, simply sweep aside the lowest price and highest scored proposal based on one sentence of many tens of thousands, that it felt was objectionable.

In fact, the Hawaii Procurement code was written with this logic in mind. The code is not intended for the City to cry “gotcha.” It is written to create a situation where the City becomes an agent to seek the best value on behalf of the taxpayers. In fact in HAR 3-122-97, it states:

A proposal shall be rejected for reasons including but not limited to:

(B) The proposal, after any opportunity has passed for modification or clarification, fails to meet the announced requirements of the agency in some material respect…(emphasis added.)

If the City truly believed that Bombardier’s sentence created a conditional proposal, and despite whether the City believes it warned Bombardier or not about submitting such a proposal, the Procurement Code clearly establishes a road to seeking the best value for taxpayers. As had been done on other bids in numerous jurisdictions including those involving Federal Government funds, all the City had to do was to provide an opportunity for Bombardier to address this issue and even withdraw the sentence.

Yet, instead, the City has pursued a course of action of defending its position and award, which has led to a wide range of taxpayers questioning the wisdom of its actions and created a lack of

trust in the City’s stewardship of this large and complex Project. The City’s defense of appeals from both Bombardier and Sumitomo has a common theme, namely:

1) All protests are untimely, as they should have been made prior to submission of Offers.

2) While the RFP may be poorly drafted and constructed in several instances, it stands.

While these have so far proven to be successful defenses for the City, with all due respect, I must suggest that the HART Board of Directors have a more compelling interest and that is to get this procurement right for the future of Honolulu and to ensure that the best value has truly been obtained for the City.

THERE IS TIME TO GET THE CORE SYSTEMS RIGHT

Fortunately, there is time for the HART Board of Directors to take charge and get this right. The HART Interim Executive Director made a presentation to you at a recent Board meeting indicating that the bulk of the anticipated $1.55B federal funding, via the Federal Full Funding Grant Agreement (FFGA), is now not expected until October 2012. Additionally, the City Council has stated its preference not to release significant funding from the excise tax account or permit the floating of City bonds to advance funds to the project until the FFGA is secured. For these reasons, significant construction cannot begin at this time and a reasonable delay in executing the Core Systems contract will neither affect the Project schedule nor delay jobs, and especially construction jobs, from being created.

Bombardier continues to believe that the best and most efficient course of action is to reverse the improper disqualification of Bombardier’s proposal and permit the evaluation of all three Offerors to pick up where it left off, including full consideration of Bombardier’s proposal. We believe the results will be compelling and will provide confidence to taxpayers that HART truly has acted fully to ensure that the best value was obtained. Such a course of action can be accomplished very swiftly as most of the work has already been completed.

Should the course of action above not be possible, there is another avenue that is viable. HART can call for new bids from all three Offerors, which can be accomplished, in a reasonable period of time, likely not to exceed two months. Such an action has been taken in other jurisdictions when a situation arises that potentially taints the procurement process.

We are aware that Sumitomo has suggested to you that, should the Ansaldo Honolulu proposal ultimately be rejected, Sumitomo ought to be awarded the contract. You should be aware, however that this would create a situation where HART selects the most expensive proposal of the three submitted to the City, as the City’s NPV analysis attached to this letter clearly shows. With Bombardier’s proposal reinserted into the evaluation, awarding to Sumitomo would also mean that the City would have selected the lowest scoring and highest priced proposal of the three Priority Listed offerors.

OTHER FEATURES OF THE BOMBARDIER PROPOSAL

The Bombardier proposal also contained many important elements that were passed over in the course of this controversy and to which, as HART Board members, you have not been informed of. For example, Bombardier was the only Offeror to include local assembly in Honolulu of a majority of the fleet of rail cars, thereby not only creating local jobs, but also careers for people who would then migrate into the operations & maintenance of the system. Bombardier was again the only Offeror to propose 3-car trains thereby providing a higher level of comfort with 50% more seating per train than any other Offeror. Bombardier created training and internship arrangements with both the University of Hawaii-Manoa and Leeward Community College. In fact we already employ UH graduates on the mainland and have sponsored seven summer interns to-date.

Bombardier also included both noise & vibration and corrosion control experts on our team to address very significant concerns in Honolulu and, perhaps most importantly, we included the Vancouver SkyTrain Operating Company on our team to ensure that Honolulu’s system would be operated correctly right from start. No other proposal included these important features.

Unfortunately, all of these elements were simply passed over due to the City’s actions in disqualifying Bombardier’s proposal without specific discussions as required under the Hawaii Procurement code and because Bombardier took that action of pointing out an ambiguity in the RFP as, in fact, was its obligation to do under the RFP requirements.

I highly suggest that you review all three proposals available to you so that you can decide for yourself about the quality of all three proposals.

CONCLUSION

In summary, Bombardier wishes to make the following points to the HART Board of Directors:

Bombardier hereby extends the validity of its proposal through October 31, 2011. Bombardier will not change the price in this proposal.
Bombardier is a financially strong, serious, and highly respected global leader in the supply of rail transit and aerospace products and solutions, and at no time did Bombardier “play games” to gain an unfair advantage in Honolulu.
Bombardier hereby waives the “condition” in its proposal relating to liability exclusions that the City believes is contained therein and Bombardier confirms that it meets all of the requirements of the RFP. The Hawaii Procurement code clearly permits the withdrawal of any such “conditions” prior to the City being compelled to disqualify a proposal.
Bombardier delivered the lowest total price to the City in its BAFO #2 proposal and received the highest technical and management scores of all three proposals from the City evaluators.
The HART Board of Directors has a compelling interest in not just defending past City actions but in being stewards in seeking the best value and most compelling solution for taxpayers and the future of Honolulu.
With a delay in Federal funding until October 2012, there is time to get the critical Core Systems Contract right. This should be of utmost interest and concern.
The City will be engaging a Core Systems Contractor for at least an 18-year period and therefore it is critical that a financially strong and capable Offeror be chosen who has delivered the most compelling and cost-effective proposal.

We truly hope that this letter helps Board members understand the reasons why Bombardier’s proposal should be fully considered. The Honolulu Rail project is too important to the future of the City not to be done right. The HART Board of Directors has the chance now to make this right, restore public trust in the process and act in the interests of the taxpayers. We look forward to a solution that will benefit all of the citizens of Hawaii and that will ensure a successful and affordable project for generations to come.

Sincerely,

Andrew S. Robbins, P.E. (Hawaii License # PE-8125)

Vice President, Business Development

Bombardier Transportation

(Hawaii Contractor’s License # CT-30643)

LINK: Bombardier Letter to HART 8.31.11

Attachments area

Preview YouTube video Ansaldo vs Bombardier Honolulu Rail Part One
Preview YouTube video Honolulu Rail Car Ansaldo Rip Off Preview YouTube video Honolulu Rail Car Contract a Disgrace

Re: OHA SPONSORED HONOULIULI PUEO WORKING GROUP

Inbox

Michael Lee

Aug 2 (2 days ago)

to David, Kalani, Alan, Alika, Andy, Kalani, Owana, Javier, Jack, Javier, Javier, Suzanne, Pua, Hawaii, Hinaleimoana, Ed, Mike, Jon, Ruby, Georgiana, Kaukaohu, Association, Hui, KAHEA:, Catherine

On Wednesday, August 2, 2017, 5:35:28 AM HST, Michael Lee <keakuaskahu777@yahoo.com> wrote:

Wednesday August 2, 2017

Aloha Friends;

Yesterday at OHA's Board of Trustees Beneficiary Concerns we were able to get OHA to sponsor a Honouliuli Ewa Oahu Community Pueo Habitat Conservation Plan Working Group to be made up from our Community with OHA hosting invitations to the private land owners of HART RAIL. DHHL. HUNT Development, DR Hortan Hoopili Development, UHWO Development., and Palihua Ranch, and the Nature Conservancy Honouliuli Land Trust with the goal to invite them to sit down and talk about a perpetual Conservation Easement.

Kai Markell OHA's Manager of Compliance and Enforcement under the Administration oversight of OHA's CEO Kamanaopono Crabbe will be in charge of this OHA sponsord Working Goroup in hosting our meetings and sending out invitaations to the principle private land owners.

We can only move one important step at a time.

Everything is all about relationships, redemption, and proccess. and prayer, and "KOKUA".

Mahalo Keakua for being with us at OHA yesterday;

Kumu Michael Kumukauoha Lee

Native Hawaiian Cultural Practitioner

91-1200 Keaunui Drive Unit 614

Ewa Beach Hawaii 96706

**********************************************************************************************

Hawai`i Free Press

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Friday, August 4, 2017

Vol VI No. 662 Part 3 - The Railroaded Rail from John Bond,Tom Berg; Other Projects, etc.