STERLING — Six new security cameras, mounted on a tall black pole, watch over the spacious lawn in front of the Logan County administration building from every conceivable angle.
From a wooden gazebo nearby, and from a building annex, 16 more cameras guard both sides of the lawn, the rear of the county building and the parking lot.
County Commissioner Jim Edwards spearheaded the drive for this new security system. Edwards provided the specifications. And Edwards’ store, New Age Electronics, was the only company to bid on the project.
The owner of a competing store says that’s because Edwards specified an unavailable component in the bid request.
County business has thrived at the commissioner’s electronics and office-supply store since he took office in 2009.
A comparison of county purchases at four other electronics and office- supply stores shows Edwards’ share of the business jumped from 21 percent in the two years before his election to 51 percent in his first two years as commissioner. Through September this year, his share climbed to 67 percent.
Logan County taxpayers have spent $152,028 there in 34 months.
At Sterling Computer Center, co-owner Marv Ferdig points to the new surveillance system as one example of wasteful spending that benefited a county commissioner.
“Why does a town of 12,000 people need a surveillance system like that? I can’t remember the last murder in Sterling,” he said.
Edwards acknowledges he provided specifications and advice on the surveillance system. But he said he has stayed “totally away” from other bid requests to New Age Electronics and abstains from voting on them.
“I’ve done nothing to improve or increase the business since I’ve become county commissioner,” he said.
Edwards also noted there has been no vandalism since the surveillance system was installed and said it will prove useful if there are future incidents.
Already, the system identified a bicycle tied up day and night by the county annex building, he said. The county called police — and it turned out to be stolen.
On the commission
Edwards had not planned to run for county commissioner in 2008. His brother George, the Republican candidate, died of cancer less than two months before the election, and the party chose him to take his place.
He contends he has saved Logan County money by recycling computers and offering technical expertise. He also cut costs on the surveillance system, he said, by using county employees to install it.
“I pray to God often and ask him why he put me here,” Edwards said. He said he has accomplished some very good things for the county as a first-term commissioner, and, “He just keeps telling me, ‘There’s more.’ “
Logan County has no manager and relies on the commissioners to supervise department heads and set their agency budgets.
Since January, all three Logan County commissioners are Republicans. So are the elected assessor and county clerk, the two biggest county customers at Edwards’ store this year.
New Age Electronics was the sole bidder or not the low bidder on several large county purchases from the store, county records show.
Edwards’ store also prospered from purchases of smaller items: $1,600 for a dozen chair mats, $2,103 to furnish new Commissioner Dave Donaldson’s office, $448 for the notebook computer Edwards buried in a county time capsule, $1,832 for commissioners’ conference room chairs.
And his store has gained county government business on office supplies — things such as paper, toner, cartridges, stamps and calendars typically purchased without a bid.
In 2007, before Edwards ran for commissioner, county agencies bought $1,762 worth of items identified as office supplies from his store, county finance records show. In nine months this year, those same agencies have spent $9,570 for office supplies from New Age.
Effect on rival stores
Meanwhile, county business at four competing stores — Journal Office Supply, Kentec Communications Inc., Rodine Communications and Sterling Computer Center — has dwindled.
At Journal Office, county government purchases peaked at $50,000 in 2008, then dropped by half in two years.
Store owner Jim Horner isn’t surprised that county business has shifted to New Age Electronics. This year, for example, Logan County approved a $11,395 color copier purchase from Edwards’ store after Horner’s store offered a choice of other color copiers for $1,500 to $4,600 less.
Horner said the rationale given by the county clerk — that the model purchased from New Age Electronics offered a feature unavailable from the Journal Office copiers — simply wasn’t true.
The growing county business at a county commissioner’s store, among other things, has spawned a band of critics in Sterling that calls itself the Logan County Citizens’ Oversight Committee.
Jim Leh, a retired district judge and former commissioner, is among the critics.
“I think a lot of people are uncomfortable. There’s a phrase in the court system — the appearance of impropriety,” Leh said.
Debbie Zwirn, chairwoman of the Logan County Commission, responded that there’s a good reason for New Age’s success.
“A lot of our other elected officials really like working with New Age. They trusted them and liked their work so much,” she said. “Why do they get so much of the county’s business? Because they’re good.”
Two elected officials, the assessor and the county clerk, have accounted for three-fourths of county spending at New Age Electronics through September this year.
County Assessor Peggy Michaels, who was re-elected in 2010, spent $23,771 there, buying everything from a server shared with the county computers, to software, a chair, bookcase, file cabinet, shelf dividers and paper. That’s more than all county agencies combined spent at Edwards’ store in 2007.
New Age was the only bidder, at $3,640, for four computers in her office. Two other stores offered “no bid,” the assessor wrote.
She said her office sent out three letters requesting bids for the four computers, and only New Age responded.
Her office does not send a second round of letters if only one company bids, but “that policy may change,” she said.
Pamela Schneider, the county clerk, has spent $12,838 in nine months at New Age Electronics, mainly for the color copier.
She said she also took into account New Age’s lower maintenance fees when she bought the more expensive copier and never considered that a county commissioner owned the business.
Edwards contends the request for the county’s new video surveillance system also came from Schneider, an account she disputes.
After someone broke the windows outside her office in July 2009, “I sent an e-mail wondering if we had ever looked into a security system,” she said. “That’s pretty much the extent of what I did. I asked a question.”
She expected the commissioners might install a building alarm. “I could care less what’s going on on the lawn,” she said.
Edwards said the commissioners feared that installing a security system in a historic building might not be permitted, so they chose an outdoor system. The state historical society says no such restriction exists.
Security system questions
His store was one of four asked to bid on the specifications he supplied for security cameras.
Kentec was another. Kent Sager, its owner, said one of the specified components, a JVC video capture card, was unavailable on the market. The company named in the bid confirmed that it does not make the requested part.
“That’s why we didn’t bid,” Sager said.
New Age Electronics submitted the winning — and only — bid with a different company’s video card, county records show.
Edwards said he asked a New Age employee for parts “for different video systems that we use,” and “I don’t know what the JVC means.”
But a 16-port video card “is not an uncommon part,” he said, and bidders could have chosen one from another manufacturer.
Jack McLavey, the lone Democrat on the Logan County Commission until term limits forced him out of office this year, described Edwards as the driving force behind the lawn surveillance system.
McLavey said he voted for the system only in the spirit of cooperation.
“Where could you possibly put 20 cameras?” he said he objected when the plan was presented.
Edwards, who abstained from voting, “was the one who took the initiative and came up with the plan,” he said.
New Age Electronics submitted the sole bid of $5,664 for security camera equipment and then was paid $1,657 for accessories, netting about half the total costs of a $14,773 system, county records show.
Bids were not requested on those accessories.
“I don’t think there is a conflict of interest,” Edwards said. “We’re not required to go out for bid on every item.”
In Logan County, departments are not required to seek competitive bids on items costing less than $1,000.
County records list Sterling Computer Center as another local business solicited for surveillance system equipment. Ferdig said he doesn’t remember receiving a request but has largely given up bidding against the commissioner’s store anyway.
“We just flat stopped bidding,” Ferdig said. “It’s a mess. From the day he walks into the office until the day he leaves, it’s a conflict of interest.”
Colorado law forbids government employees to perform an official act that benefits a business in which they have an interest. It also forbids misusing official information to acquire a pecuniary interest in any transaction.
Luis Toro, the director of Colorado Ethics Watch, said Edwards did not violate the first law if he abstained on county votes involving his business, but the surveillance system bid could raise questions about misuse of information.
“If he was in a position to set up a bid,” Toro said, “I do think the district attorney or the attorney general should take a look.”
Edwards said he follows strict ethical standards.
“I don’t promote New Age Electronics,” he said, “and I don’t talk down the competition.”
David Olinger: 303-954-1498 or dolinger@denverpost.com
Got a tip?
This story was a result of a tip to the investigative team at The Denver Post. You can reach our investigative reporters at 303-893-TIPS (8477) or toll-free at 866-748-TIPS or e-mail us at TIPS@denverpost.com.
