Colorado State Fair booster Sen. Abel Tapia has spent eight years in the Capitol corralling money for the fiscally faltering enterprise while his engineering firm received nearly half a million dollars in fair contracts, records show.
As the Pueblo Democrat rose to power atop an influential budgeting committee, so too rose the fortunes of his district’s fair and the price tags on the contracts he received.
A Denver Post investigation has found that Tapia seven times sponsored or voted for bills that directed millions of dollars to the financially struggling fair, including one bill to secure funds for a project on which his firm was working.
Fair officials said Abel Engineering Professionals edged out competitors because the company was local and best suited for the jobs.
Tapia, after inquiries from 9News and The Post, drafted a letter asking the legislative ethics panel whether the contracts represent a conflict of interest.
“I don’t believe I’ve done anything I shouldn’t have done,” Tapia said. “The appearance of conflict, that’s a very nebulous thing. . . . When we talk about appearances, I don’t know where to draw the line.”
Tapia said he refrained from calling state department heads or appearing at contract interviews when his company sought work with the fair or other entities. His actions do not appear to violate state law, although critics say the contracts reveal both a conflict of interest and a weakness in state rules limiting how elected officials do business with the state.
Colorado is one of 22 states that put few if any restrictions on lawmakers snagging government contracts, according to a survey by the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Senate rules require Colorado lawmakers to publicly declare conflicts of interest but don’t bar them from voting on or sponsoring legislation.
Tapes of several committee and floor sessions reveal no occasion when Tapia stated his stake in the state fair, even while he was under contract, and the lawmaker confirmed that he did not declare a conflict.
A general benefit for fair
The 2006 revamp of a fairgrounds carnival lot shows how Tapia’s firm benefited from legislation that he helped pass, but the lawmaker more frequently pushed bills with a general benefit for the fair, records show.
A paved lot needed 400 new water and electrical hookups if fair officials wanted to compete for camper rallies and other events.
Tapia’s engineering firm in October 2006 received the $124,800 contract from fair officials to design and oversee the lot’s face-lift.
Tapia — at the time head of the powerful appropriations and joint budget committees — then secured $1.1 million for the project as part of a slate of other funding requests. Five months later, his firm received another $50,000 for its work on the lot, records reveal.
Tapia said he never made the connection between the line item in a several billion-dollar budget and his own firm. Had he connected those dots, he said he would have declared a conflict.
The practice may be legal but isn’t ethical, according to Bob Stern, president of the Los Angeles-based Center for Governmental Studies, a nonprofit that studies ethics in state government.
“There’s clearly something wrong with this,” Stern said. “Colorado is a part-time legislature. You have to have outside income, and that creates more potential for conflicts of interest.”
Ten states pay lawmakers the equivalent of a full-time salary, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Awards lacked competition
Abel Engineering’s status as a disadvantaged minority-owned business, its participation in a state pool of go-to contractors and its Pueblo address stacked up in its favor when it came to state fair contracts.
The company was a natural choice, said fair manager Chris Wiseman, who lauded Abel Engineering for its experience with the state’s lengthy contracting process and its ability to complete projects on deadline.
“We have horse shows, the annual street rods,” Wiseman said. “We really need the construction jobs done around those events. A local company seems to be much more willing to show up and do the job.”
None of the fair’s engineering contracts is awarded through competitive bids. Instead, facility managers either select an engineer from a state-managed pool for smaller projects or choose a contractor through interviews and rankings. The process follows state procurement rules.
In the Pueblo region, there are more than two dozen firms similar to Tapia’s from which fair and other state agency officials can choose. The companies sign up through the state to handle contracts worth $50,000 or less, fair officials said.
Tapia’s firm received nine contracts or amendments to contracts from the state fair in an eight-year stretch. They totaled $481,483.
The contracts began small — $45,800 to cover a horse arena — and, as time progressed, reached as high as $174,800 total for the carnival lot.
By comparison, six other engineering firms split seven state fair contracts in the same time frame, officials said.
Tapia also received an additional $18,230 in no-bid contracts from other state entities, including Colorado State University at Pueblo, the Department of Corrections and the Department of Military Affairs, according to information from the state Department of Personnel.
Tapia saw “bright future”
“I see a very bright future for the fair,” said Tapia in 2006 as he helped usher in a plan to pump $3.2 million a year into the state fair’s coffers.
The program siphons off interest from the state’s unclaimed property and gives it to the Pueblo operation until it pays off its sizable loans. Fair officials will keep $550,000 of that sum for operations in perpetuity.
By fall of this year, the fair will be debt-free for the first time since the early 1990s, Wiseman said.
An albatross of an events center and unprofitable education programs sank the fair more than $6 million into debt before the enterprise came back under the state umbrella and Tapia threw it a funding lifesaver, Wiseman said.
Not every lawmaker favored the bailout, which faced opposition from some Republicans. The state subsidy bill most benefited the fair, but Tapia had hands in other legislation as well.
He voted for proposals to add a state fair checkoff box on state income-tax forms, which allows taxpayers to donate part of their refunds to the fair.
Tapia also voted regularly on annual appropriations bills that included money for the fair.
“It’s my obligation and my responsibility,” Tapia said, “to ensure that the state fair becomes profitable and continues to be an agricultural showcase.”
Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com
State fair contracts for lawmaker’s engineering firm
Sen. Abel Tapia’s engineering firm received nine Colorado State Fair contracts or amendments in eight years for a total of $481,483.
$90,000 for curb, gutter and sewer work — October 2007
$12,000 to rebuild the fair’s lottery building following a fire — June 2007
$124,800 to add electrical and water hookups to a carnival lot — October 2006
$50,000 in additional cash for the carnival lot project — August 2007
$81,500 for sewer, water and gas work — November 2004
$21,483 in additional cash for the sewer water and gas project — March 2005
$6,000 to repair a wall — March 2003
$49,900 to correct accessibility issues on the fairgrounds — October 2001
$45,800 to cover a horse arena — August 2000
Sources: State contracts, fair officials.
