Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser’s administration is urgently reviewing its violence-intervention contracts and grants at city agencies after federal authorities accused D.C. council member Trayon White of taking thousands of dollars in bribes to help an associate extend contracts with the D.C. government, leading to White’s arrest, the Washington Post reports. The probe will examine not only the work of the contractor at the center of the bribery case but also others who provided violence-intervention services at two agencies, aiming to identify breakdowns in oversight that could require changes to the programs, Investigators will question how and why contracts and grants were awarded — many of which were not competitive — and how the contractors’ work was performed and monitored.
The review is expected to move quickly, in the event that any findings of wrongdoing require the agencies to terminate contractors or grantees and change service providers ahead of the fiscal year starting Oct. 1. The probe is among several scrutinizing White’s interactions with critical programs that aim to reduce violence.
White’s arrest rocked the network of people and organizations working as violence interrupters, who seek to build relationships with at-risk people in neighborhoods most affected by crime to try to mediate conflicts. White was arrested by the FBI on Aug. 18 at a luxury apartment building. The FBI accused White of accepting about $35,000 in cash bribes and agreeing to accept more than $100,000 more from an associate who ran a pair of companies doing business with the District. Authorities charge that White sought to use his influence and position to secure lucrative contract extensions for those companies. The associate, was secretly working as an informant for the FBI and the meetings were recorded. On four occasions this summer, White and the informant met in a parked car, where the informant handed White cash-stuffed envelopes and asked for updates on White’s work to pressure government employees to extend the informant’s contracts.
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