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Critics Say Meals Revamp Favors
Non-Union Agencies
Political Connections Cited

By HEATHER HADDON and JORDAN MOSS

Some Bronx social service agencies are charging that the city's reorganization of the Meals on Wheels program for homebound seniors will leave unionized workers -- and the local agencies that employ them -- out in the cold. 

"The ridiculously low price of $5 . . . cannot be handled by agencies that have union contracts with 1199 and 1707," said Don Bluestone, executive director of the Mosholu Montefiore Community Center (MMCC), in a statement before the City Council Aging Committee last week. 

With the city forcing agencies to reach that price tag, MMCC's union shop can't 
compete. "Our workers need medical benefits, decent wages and other benefits," 
Bluestone said. "This is truly union busting." 

Late last year, the city Department for the Aging (DFTA) announced that it would reduce the number of Bronx meals providers from 17 to three and substitute frozen meals for daily hot meal delivery to some of the frail elderly. The three contractors would be expected to deliver to an average of over 180,000 seniors, according to a preliminary RFP. Seniors, advocates and many elected officials were enraged by the change. 

After a December meeting of providers and officials convened by Council Member Maria Baez, who chairs the Council's Committee on Aging, the city did alter its proposal.  The agency reduced the number of seniors to receive frozen meals in place of hot meals to 30 percent from 60 percent, and raised its per-meal rate to $5 from $3. DFTA also delayed the release of its request for proposals (RFP) for the program. 

While nearly all local officials originally protested the proposal, most Bronx Democrats held their fire after the December meeting organized by Baez. "This hearing cleared up many concerns and misconceptions about DFTA's plans," she said in a statement last January. 

Providers say that Baez never organized a promised follow-up meeting with the City Council's Bronx delegation. "We were never called to another meeting," said Julie Dalton, vice president of Aging in America, which is one of the current providers.

But Yuly Martinez, Baez' Chief-of-Staff, said that Baez is still planning a meeting between providers and Council Speaker Gifford Miller.

Council Member Oliver Koppell introduced a resolution in the Council last month calling for the withdrawal of the RFP since, the legislation says, it would hurt both community agencies and seniors. While 20 council members co-sponsored the resolution, Joel Rivera was the only other member from the Bronx to sign it, and he later withdrew his name. Rivera did not return a call for this article, but staffer Albert Alvarez said that he thought that there was some confusion about the situation. "Another resolution may be coming out," he said. 

Koppell doesn't think there is any ambiguity. "I think Maria Baez is campaigning to get people off of it [the resolution]," said Koppell. "She has not committed herself to opposing this RFP. She claims she got it improved . . . but it is still onerous."

His Democratic ally in the state assembly, Jeffrey Dinowitz, added his own theory. "I'm concerned that one of the purposes of the consolidation is to steer the contracts to politically-favored agencies," Dinowitz said. "And I'm concerned that's in fact why it [the overhaul] is being done in the first place."

Martinez dismissed any allegations that the contracts are being steered by Baez. "The Councilwoman refuses to advocate on the part of any of the contractors," he said. Martinez said that Baez has refused agency requests for letters of recommendation for the RFP. "She doesn't want . . . any background dealing," he said. "It will undermine her credibility among the providers."

Instead, Baez is charging Koppell with circulating letters of support for certain providers. "It does appear that [there is contract steering] when an elected official . . . is sending letters of support for local nonprofits so they can receive this RFP," said Martinez about Koppell.

The finger-pointing has, once again, exposed the political fault lines between the 
Riverdale-based Benjamin Franklin Reform Democratic Club (which Dinowitz and Koppell belong to) and the rest of the Bronx Democratic Party.

The importance of political connections in this contract war will not be clear until late spring, when the city plans to announce the three winning bidders. But the $5 cap on costs is already weeding out some longtime meal providers from the process.

Despite the $2 increase, the new caps on meals is too low for MMCC and other agencies employing union workers, according to Bluestone. In addition to food, that price tag must cover the cost of labor (including salaries and benefits), transportation expenses, and food preparation. 

Bluestone sees Regional Aid for Interim Needs (RAIN), a larger service agency, as its primary competitor because its workers do not come from the SEIU/1199 and AFSCME/DC 1707 unions that provide social service employees. "We're in at $5.97 a meal," while RAIN provides meals for $5, Bluestone said. "We're going to lose this [the contract] to RAIN." 

With eight senior centers across the Bronx, RAIN has more financial capital than most local providers. But the agency's executive director, Louis Vasquez, also has significant political pull. Vasquez once served as director of the Bronx division of DFTA. His wife, Lorraine Cortés-Vázquez, also had a 14-year tenure with DFTA, and served as the chief-of-staff for former Bronx County Democratic Chairman Roberto Ram’rez. 

In a sign of the agency's clout, Teresa Heinz Kerry, the wife of presidential candidate John Kerry, campaigned at the RAIN center in Parkchester. The forum was organized by Assemblyman Peter Rivera, Congressman Joseph Crowley and Council Member Joel Rivera.

Vasquez told the Norwood News that RAIN submitted a proposal for the meals program last month, but he would not elaborate on their standing. When asked if he had an opinion on the Meals on Wheels reorganization, Vasquez said, "Barely." 

He didn't return another call for comment regarding his relationship with Baez and other Bronx Democrats. 

Aging in America has applied for the contract covering most of the north Bronx -- 
Community Boards 7, 8 and 12. MMCC and the Riverdale YMHA will apply as the larger agency's subcontractors for seniors needing kosher meals. "Our agency was one of the few of the 17 providers that were in somewhat of a position to bid on the contract's volume," Dalton said. 

But her agency is probably competing with RAIN, which has meals programs in Boards 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 and 12, according to Vasquez. "It's not clear if we will be the lowest bid," Dalton said. 

Baez is still seeing if the $5 cap might be further increased, according to Martinez. "She's still hopeful for additional concessions and accommodations," he said. 

Theoni Angelopoulos, a DFTA spokesperson, would not provide information about which or how many agencies had applied. "We have had responses," she said. "We expect to award contracts in late spring, for a program to start July 1."

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