A Closer Look at Contractors

Chances are, most homeowners are more careful in choosing a roof repairman than are some Los Angeles County offices in doling out millions of dollars in taxpayer money. Take the county’s Community Development Commission. It managed to stroll right past some prominent clues in awarding a $3.5-million building contract to a firm whose top executive was in a federal prison cell after a drug trafficking conviction.

All that the county office did by way of a background investigation was to check a few references supplied by the company, Jaguar Rehab, and call the state government to determine whether the firm had a valid state license. It did. But Times reporter Sharon Bernstein showed that a more thorough check through the same state office would have turned up two related business licenses that had expired. Meanwhile, the one license that was valid was later suspended over Jaguar’s failure to pay another contractor. Moreover, the state contractors board had cited the company nine times for violations that included abandoning a job, failure to pay a court-ordered judgment and executing improper contracts.

A criminal check on the firm’s principal partners would have turned up far more, such as the fact that several have been convicted on cocaine, firearms or fraud charges.

By the time county officials became concerned, Jaguar’s Northridge office was shut down. The county says that much of the firm’s contract work on a child care center and housing project is so poor that it will have to be torn down or extensively repaired.

Belatedly, Supervisors Gloria Molina and Don Knabe are urging that the Community Development Commission require relevant criminal and civil litigation background checks on proposed contractors--something that should be done countywide. Molina and Knabe also want to establish a list of contractors who have defaulted or otherwise failed to fulfill obligations to the county. Both are reasonable precautions that should have been taken long ago.