DocGo — the controversial COVID testing-turned-migrant-shelter agency — quietly nabbed an almost $41 million no-bid contract with the Adams administration to run a large asylum seeker web site in Queens, The Publish has discovered.
The dodgy firm has been managing one of many metropolis’s largest migrant shelter websites at Austell Place in Lengthy Island Metropolis since September beneath a one-year emergency deal that runs by way of the autumn, in keeping with beforehand unreported public data.
The opening of the Humanitarian Emergency Response and Reduction Heart (HERRC) was touted by Mayor Eric Adams’ administration final 12 months as taking an progressive method to the asylum seeker disaster by turning an empty workplace constructing right into a 2,400-bed shelter web site.
Notably lacking from the Sept. 6, 2023 announcement was any point out of DocGo — which had its separate $432 million migrant housing and care contract rejected by the town comptroller’s workplace that very same day.
Comptroller Brad Lander, in rejecting that contract, cited the DocGo’s lack of know-how and different controversies, which embrace allegations of mistreatment of migrants towards the corporate.
Queens Councilwoman Julie Received skewered the newly-reported settlement as “unacceptable.”
“It’s actually arduous to justify the price for a way the lads are handled,” mentioned Received, who recounted horror tales from migrants, who mentioned they have been handled like “cattle” and compelled to make use of feces-covered restrooms on the web site.
“That’s the issue with our emergent contract we’re permitting individuals to get away with theft.”
Metropolis Corridor mentioned it made a handshake take care of DocGo to run the LIC HERRC web site final summer season, before Lander stripped the administration of its power to strike emergency offers with migrant providers contractors with out prior approval.
Whereas DocGo has been dealing with providers on the web site for the final 9 months, the contract was simply finalized Thursday so Metropolis Corridor might lower the corporate its examine, in keeping with the administration and public paperwork.
The operation of the positioning is anticipated to exit for bidding after the contract expires in September.
“We have been chosen and commenced offering providers in September 2023,” mentioned a DocGo spokesman, including there have been a number of events seeking to run the positioning on the time.
Metropolis Corridor confirmed two different corporations expressed curiosity within the contract, however that it didn’t undergo the everyday aggressive bidding course of.
Information of DocGo’s involvement within the HERRC comes a month after the administration mentioned it was transferring away from the corporate by not renewing its huge contract to deal with asylum seekers upstate and in elements of the town, which lawmakers had been advised included the Austell Place web site.
“It’s all information to me,” mentioned Council member Gale Brewer (D-Manhattan) when advised in regards to the deal.
Brewer has held up DocGo for instance of the place emergency no-bid contracting powers can go awry final summer season within the wake of the mistreatment accusations towards the agency and allegations it served terrible yet pricey meals to migrants that ended up in dumpsters.
“What I really feel indignant about is we have been advised no extra emergency contacts and right here we’re giving cash to a for-profit firm as an alternative of a non-profit,” she mentioned.
The town had relied closely on emergency contracting, powers that have been approved by Lander’s workplace within the early days of the migrant disaster to permit the administration to rapidly strike offers to take care of the tens of hundreds of asylum seekers who had come to the Massive Apple.
However since final fall, in response to the blowback over DocGo, the administration has mentioned it has tried to shift away from these contracts and vowed to place extra out for public bidding to attain extra aggressive pricing.
“The town is submitting this emergency contract with the Comptroller’s Workplace to pay the seller for 9 months of beforehand supplied and permitted providers at this web site and on-going providers for simply one other three months, after which the positioning might be managed by a vendor chosen by way of a aggressive course of,” mentioned Metropolis Corridor spokesperson William Fowler.
