Over at Strategic Thoughts, David Schreck is reporting Community Living British Columbia will be directly awarding $407,800 worth of information technology contracts to four companies: ACB Consulting, CRB Consulting, Ramsay IT Solutions Ltd. and Health Information Canada Incorporated (HII) The awarding of those contracts without competition is somewhat ironic, since this is the same provincial government agency that got into trouble for directly awarding contracts valued at more than $214,000 to its former interim chief executive Doug Walls. So, earlier today, Public Eye asked agency acting communications director Val Richmond why the authority wasn't awarding those information technology contracts via a public tendering process.

The response: "These contractors have a high degree of knowledge (about the project) requirements - as well as the sector and intimate knowledge of the (project) development. And there's a limited likelihood that others would be able offer that same level of knowledge and understanding within our time frame. We're under a very tight time frame to get the new service delivery model up and running."

Ms. Richmond added the authority did a cost-benefit analysis to determine those receiving the awards were the best contracts to do the work. That analysis was conducted by Community Living British Columbia's corporate services vice-president Richard Hunter and chief information officer Alan Pollock. The final decision to award the contract was made by authority chief executive office Rick Mowles.