Citizens For Good Government: What is going on with the Jefferson Performing Arts Center?

Citizens for Good Government (CFGG) is a Jefferson Parish citizens watchdog group. CFGG will be providing regular updates on a variety of issues impacting Jefferson Parish. The opinions expressed are those of CFGG and not necessarily those of ClickJefferson.com.

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What in the world is going on with the Jefferson Performing Arts Center? Is anyone working on it? Is it ever going to be finished? These are just some of the questions we have heard time and time again. Citizens for Good Government decided it was time to look into JPAC.

For one thing, CFGG officers have spoken out about the Performing Arts Center contract at the last two Jefferson Parish Council meetings. We are particularly upset about the fact that the taxpayers of Jefferson have been forced to bear the entire burden of the $18 million in cost overruns for this contract.

Parish officials apparently blame the original architect, Mr. Marcel Wiznia, for most of the problems that have been encountered in building the Arts Center, and they have filed a lawsuit against Mr. Wisznia. At the June 30th Council meeting, at which we opposed approving the seventh change order for JPAC adding $7.6 million to the contract cost, we asked the following questions.

Why was Mr. Wiznia selected as the original architect if he was so incompetent? Was he vetted? Were his plans double-checked by a consultant who knows these types of structures an d their requirements? Why did Code Enforcement approve the plans with stairways not meeting code and not enough exits? Why were the design flaws not caught by Code Enforcement, the State Fire Marshal, the building contractor, or anyone else during the bidding process? Why weren't the plans corrected before the contractor started to build? In order to get answers to these questions, we decided to do our own investigation.

However, the first thing we did was to contact the Louisiana Legislative Auditor's Office, and we filed a formal request to have the Jefferson Performing Arts Center contract audited. A contract with so many unanswered questions, as well as cost overruns of 68% of the original contract amount and whose completion date has been delayed by years, demands an audit by the Legislative Auditor.

We then began our investigation into the Performing Arts Center contract by searching the Times-Picayune archives. We found 43 Times-Picayune articles on JPAC, starting in 1997. Then Councilman Chris Roberts provided us with copies of 11 Jefferson Parish Council resolutions concerning JPAC, together with supporting documentation. We prepared a draft document entitled, "History of JPAC", which is a tabular presentation containing a chronological summary of the information which we collected, and this is a work in progress. We have provided this 12-page document to the Legislative Auditor, as well as to anyone who is interested in our JPAC investigation.

For the purposes of this column, we will discuss what our research has turned up on the selection of the original architect for JPAC, Mr. Marcel Wisznia. In April 1998 the Council voted to advertise for a firm to design a performing arts center, as well as a community center, a promenade and observation towers. Mr. Wisznia's company was one of five firms which the Technical Evaluation Committee determined to be qualified to do this work. Although the Technical Evalulation Committee ranked Mr. Wisznia's company only fourth of the five qualified companies, Wisznia was selected for the contract by Councilman John Lavarine Jr., since JPAC would be built in Mr. Lavarine's Council district, and Mr. Wisznia had been involved with Mr. Lavarine in planning the use of the remaining 47 acres of the LaSalle tract.

Unfortunately, there was no further "vetting" of Mr. Wisznia, nor were any other architectural firms even considered for designing the performing arts center, since Mr. Wiszinia's contract was merely amended multiple times for the JPAC design. After Mr. Wisznia's original contract was increased by $2.6 million almost four years later to design the Performing Arts Center, the Times-Picayune reported on March 20, 2002 that building the proposed performing arts complex was "a type of project [Mr. Wisznia's] company has never before undertaken."

The article continued, "That doesn't concern Councilman John Lavarine Jr., however, who is recommending the firm because of the excellent job it has done managing the development of the LaSalle Park project. In step with council tradition, Lavarine has taken the lead in suggesting which firms receive professional service contracts for the park because it is in his district."

The following is another quote from the article, "Wisznia Associates has never designed an arts center like the one proposed, according to Wisznia. But the firm has hired a team of subconsultants who specialize in the design, acoustics and lighting of performing arts centers to ensure the LaSalle venue will be top-notch."

This is the story of how Mr. Wisznia was selected to design the Jefferson Performing Arts Center. Citizens for Good Government has concluded that the council tradition whereby individual Councilmen are permitted to choose the firms which receive professional service contracts for their districts, even for projects of the magnitude and importance of JPAC, is totally unacceptable. Just look at the disaster that has resulted from the Performing Arts contract, which has cost the citizens of Jefferson an additional $18 million, since the project is 68% over budget, and its completion is long delayed. The Council needs to discard this tradition.

Citizens for Good Government is continuing our research into JPAC, and we will continue to provide information which we uncover to the Legislative Auditor.

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Membership in Citizens for Good Government is free. To find out more about Citizens for Good Government or receive their email newsletter, please contact Vice-Chairman Margie Seemann at mseemann@aol.com .