AUSTIN – After months of downplaying his involvement in a no-bid state contract that collapsed in scandal last December, a former lobbyist for the company that got the deal is changing his story.
The lobbyist, James Frinzi, acknowledged in a deposition made public this week that while his firm worked to get a $90 million contract extension, he spoke more than 100 times with the project manager, a powerful state official with whom he had recently been a business partner.
Frinzi disclosed telephone records to support his account, providing the most concrete evidence of the extent of his relationship with the official, then-state health commission lawyer Jack Stick. The men, who worked together between 2002 and 2011, have drawn scrutiny as investigators scramble to figure out why Stick might have helped Austin technology company 21CT with the Medicaid fraud detection contract, which was worth $20 million when given in 2012 and later set to expand to $110 million.
via Official and lobbyist in contract scandal talked dozens of times, records show – Houston Chronicle.