We all know Michigan's roads are in terrible shape, and every available dollar, and then some, will be needed to get them upgraded to even fair condition. Which is why this Free Press report is, what's the word, infuriating:
An analysis by a University of Michigan researcher has found that the state spent $90 million more to hire private contractors for engineering and design work than it would have if it had maintained that work in-house over just one three-year period.
Roland Zullo, director of the Center for Labor and Community Studies at the University of Michigan-Dearborn and associate research scientist at the University of Michigan School of Social Work, reviewed contracts from 2011 to 2014 and determined that the state overspent for engineering and design services in order to make up for “self-inflicted” staffing shortages at MDOT.
“It really shocked us on the amount of money spent on the private consultants. It’s hard to imagine how that money was justified,” Zullo said.
Caveats: Zullo worked with a union, the Service Employees International Union Local 517M, which helped structure the study and paid the $2,990 bill to obtain documents under the Freedom of Information Act. Zullo did the study independently, he said.
The biggest cost overruns came in the area of consultancy contracts for design and engineering, which when done by outside groups, are vastly more expensive than when MDOT employees do the same work. Keeping the work in-house used to be routine, until efforts to reduce staff through early retirements led to more outsourcing.
Would more employees kept on the job still have been less expensive? That could require another study.
