AUSTIN — Attorney General Ken Paxton’s top lieutenant resigned for a second time on Friday. Paxton’s office announced First Assistant Attorney General Chip Roy’s resignation in March. His second resignation came the day after The Dallas Morning News reported that Roy and at least one other … Read More
Former First Assistant Attorney General Chip Roy on Friday defended receiving thousands of dollars in salary and benefits after leaving the attorney general’s office to join a pro-Ted Cruz super PAC. In a written statement to the Tribune, Roy responded to a report Thursday in … Read More
AUSTIN — The state is paying thousands of dollars in salaries and benefits to at least two former high-level staffers in Attorney General Ken Paxton’s office who haven’t worked there for over a month. Charles “Chip” Roy resigned as first … Read More
The Texas Rangers have launched a criminal investigation into Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller‘s use of taxpayer funds to bankroll two out-of-state trips, the Department of Public Safety confirmed Wednesday. The investigation follows complaints filed by the liberal advocacy group Progress … Read More
Lucy Nashed, communications director for Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller, has resigned after the agriculture department gave contradictory reports to different media outlets on whether Miller had used state funds to compete in a rodeo. Nashed, who worked for former … Read More
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has been charged in federal court with allegedly misleading investors in a technology company. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed the charges Monday in a Sherman-based court. They are similar to the allegations Paxton … Read More
The Texas health commission finally has chosen a company to run a long-delayed massive data project, awarding it to the same firm whose tentative contract was canceled in 2014. The commission disclosed this week that it had decided to award … Read More
Travis County prosecutors are no longer leading a year-long criminal investigation into a controversial state technology deal that led to sweeping contracting reforms and have transferred the case to another law enforcement agency. Gregg Cox — chief of the Travis … Read More
AUSTIN — The Travis County District Attorney’s Office has transferred its investigation of a controversial no-bid contract to another law enforcement agency better able to handle the complicated case. Travis County Public Integrity Unit chief Gregg Cox disclosed the move … Read More
UPDATE: The Travis County Public Integrity Unit has forwarded the criminal investigation into the 21 CT matter to another undisclosed investigative unit. Per the Unit’s head, the investigation is starting to move faster and was moved for reason of expertise … Read More
6) Bad Deals – Another session, another agency in scandal, another chief forced out. This time it was Health and Human Services Commissioner (and former state senator) Kyle Janek, plus his chief counsel (and former Travis County state rep) Jack … Read More
AUSTIN — During his 14 years as Texas’ top lawyer, Greg Abbott oversaw a significant — and expensive — escalation of police and firepower in the attorney general’s office, which now boasts 160 cops and an arsenal of assault rifles, … Read More
AUSTIN — House budget writers held a four-hour hearing Thursday on a long-running procurement mess at the state attorney general’s office. Guess who completely escaped mention? Gov. Greg Abbott, that’s who. That was curious because Abbott was attorney general for … Read More
AUSTIN — Attorney General Ken Paxton has removed 11 technology contractors who were working on a problem-plagued upgrade to the state’s child-support data system.The shakeup comes as House members are set next week to begin an investigation into how the … Read More
The Health and Human Services Commission ruled Monday that it followed state contracting rules when it doled out a $68 million technology deal in September and that it doesn’t have to rebid the job. Deputy Executive Commissioner Ron Pigott dismissed … Read More
Jack Stick says he’s “the whipping boy,” the guy who became the face of the 21CT contract scandal as Texas officials pointed fingers and scrambled to save their own jobs. “I think in December of last year, people began to … Read More
Former Texas health official Jack Stick tried to persuade dozens of other states to buy Austin technology company 21CT’s Medicaid fraud detection system even as he privately complained that the results it produced for Texas were worth “a bucket of … Read More
A Texas jury on Tuesday acquitted a former Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas executive of a felony charge that he deceived the agency’s executive director and general counsel to get an $11.04 million grant approved for a pharmaceutical … Read More
A name familiar to many Medicaid dentists who have felt the sting of Doug Wilson and Jack Stick’s Office of Inspector General in the last few years has resigned, per the Texas Tribune. Cody Cazares, an aide to former Health … Read More
Four firms provided “proof of concept” demonstrations of their Medicaid fraud detection software to the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and its Office of Inspector General back in 2011. These proof of concept projects allowed the firms to access … Read More
The press has uncovered a lot of conduct unbecoming at the Texas Health and Human Services Commission and its Office of Inspector General in the last eight months. First there was the Sunset Advisory Commission with its damning report on … Read More
Update, 1:10 p.m. Recent scandals and newspaper headlines were not the reason that Kyle Janek stepped down from the agency, Janek told reporters a few minutes ago.Gov. Greg Abbott did not pressure Janek to resign, he added, and Janek initiated … Read More
AUSTIN – Nearly six months after a scandal over a $110 million no-bid contract rocked the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, Gov. Greg Abbott said Friday that executive commissioner Kyle Janek would resign July 1.Former second-in-command Chris Traylor will … Read More
Texas Health and Human Services Executive Commissioner Kyle Janek, M.D., announced today he is stepping down from his position effective July 1 to make way for new leadership as the agency prepares for major reorganization. “I’ve been honored to lead … Read More
What’s that thundering coming from the Health and Human Services Commission building? It’s the sound of Executive Commissioner Kyle Janek’s top people running out the door. Since December — when the commission began burning in the spotlight because of millions of dollars … Read More
The company at the center of a state contracting scandal, Austin data analytics firm 21CT, has dismissed its $90 million defamation lawsuit against James Frinzi, the firm’s former lobbyist turned newspaper whistle-blower. Source: 21CT drops lawsuit against fired lobbyist James … Read More
AUSTIN — The Texas Health and Human Services Commission again has fallen behind on a major data project that now has cost taxpayers $12 million over the past decade even though officials have not yet even chosen a contractor.Two weeks … Read More
The contracting reforms that Gov. Greg Abbott issued in January appear to have had such limited impact that they probably would not have prevented the 21CT scandal that prompted them. Public-Information records from 13 state agencies suggest that such policies … Read More
Two articles from the Houston Chronicle this last week should send shivers down the spine of every Texan about what kind of government his or her tax dollars are buying. The whole contracting fiasco in the Texas Health and Human Services … Read More
AUSTIN – A sophisticated software program crunched through a sea of Texas hospital records in July 2013, instantaneously comparing payment records against Medicaid rules to identify $4.4 million in questionable spending and start a process that eventually returned the money … Read More
AUSTIN – A renewed effort to evaluate state contracting oversight could end up illustrating an uncomfortable reality, former lawmakers and government watchdogs say: even the strictest of safeguards will not work if not taken seriously by agency officials. Despite an … Read More
State Rep. John Kuempel, chairman of the House General Investigating and Ethics Committee, launched an official inquiry Monday into contracting practices at 11 state agencies.Kuempel requested information on contracts at the Health and Human Services Commission, where questions surrounding a $20 million, … Read More
Gregg Cox, the Travis County prosecutor who oversees the embattled Public Integrity Unit, on Monday rejected a request from the Department of Public Safety to re-open an investigation into controversial border security contracts, telling Director Steve McCraw the unit does … Read More
Yesterday both the Austin American Statesman and Texas Tribune published new scathing exposes on contract handling at the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. Close personal relations with lobbyist of successful contractor This time however the stories did not involve … Read More
Three years ago, a company called Geo Care Inc. failed to win a contract from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission to privatize the Kerrville State Hospital, one of the state’s 10 psychiatric facilities. So the company’s lobbyist, Frank … Read More
In August 2013, a lobbyist for a national company that privatizes state prisons emailed a bold proposal to Kyle Janek, the top official over a Texas health agency that at the time was facing scrutiny for a spate of gruesome … Read More
A Texas senator on Wednesday requested that the embattled Public Integrity Unit of the Travis County District Attorney’s office re-open its investigation into $20 million in no-bid border security contracts awarded by the Department of Public Safety to the private … Read More
If there is a silver lining to the no-bid contracting scandal at the state’s health commission, it is the response to prevent future similar debacles. In light of Gov. Greg Abbott’s independent “strike force” review of the Texas Health and … Read More
Criminal investigators looking into Texas’ no-bid contract with Austin tech firm 21CT are now delving into allegations that the former state official in charge of billions of dollars in technology contracts abused her position when she urged companies vying for … Read More
Contract High is an occasional series looking at how Texas outsourced crucial state services for two decades — and got smoked. Amid a gusher of news in recent months over a handful of troubled state contracts, lawmakers have vowed to … Read More
