Government

Carrion Presses Public Works to Make Good on Payments Owed to Vendors

Senator Samuel Carrion pressed the Dept. of Public Works during a Tuesday Finance hearing to make good on its $1.6 million debt owed to vendors. The senator honed in on the issue when he asked DPW Commissioner Derek Gabriel about the status of vendor payments. The commissioner responded, “I think we can do better. I consistently talk to our team about it because I believe in 'money in is money out' especially with what we are seeing as we have a variety of projects rolling out. We need to make sure our contractors are being paid so they can continue to bid on projects so we can continue to get them moving." Asked about DPW's turnaround time upon receipt of an invoice, Mr. Gabriel stated, "I would say anywhere from 30-60 days. We do have vendors that go way beyond that and those come from whether funding issues or sometimes the vendors have inadequate invoices… and in some cases they don’t submit invoices for months at a time." Deputy Commissioner of Public Works, Rueben Jennings, re...