It still isn’t over. Anyone who followed the quick, but torturous process to pick a private manager to run the Illinois Lottery knows it was not pretty.
There were lots of questions asked and suspicions raised along the way by participants in the process and by observers. Most notably, the Auditor General of Illinois released a report several months ago that outlined a number of concerns about how the Lottery private manager procurement process played out.
But that was long after the process technically ended, of course, with Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn naming Northstar Lottery Group in the fall of 2010, as the Lottery’s first-ever private manager.
That Northstar consortium was initially comprised of Gtech, Scientific Games and Energy BBDO/Chicago, which was the part of the management mix designated to handle advertising for the Lottery.
But Energy BBDO/Chicago was recently dumped, presumably at the behest of new Lottery superintendent Michael Jones. The hunt is now on for a new ad agency for the Lottery.
Intralot suit charges the IDOR’s McCaffrey
But more controversy continues to swirl around that aforementioned process designed to pick the Lottery private manager.
Both losing contenders for the management contract, Camelot and Intralot, had filed protests in the immediate wake of Quinn’s decision to go with Northstar. Though those protests did not yield the results that Camelot and Intralot might have hoped for, Intralot, in particular, has not given up.
Indeed, in hopes of laying bare some of what has concerned Intralot, the company filed suit earlier this month in United States Federal Court in Chicago. Defendants in the suit are listed as John W. McCaffrey in his individual capacity and Sheila Washburn in her official capacity as the Freedom of Information Act Officer at the Illinois Department of Revenue (IDOR).
McCaffrey is the former general counsel for the Illinois Department of Revenue, and he was in that post during the procurement process for the Lottery private manager. The lawsuit states that Washburn is “the current Freedom of Information Act Officer of the IDOR” and is being “sued in her official capacity for relief purposes only.”
At its core, the Intralot law suit alleges McCaffrey hired a third party to conduct a background probity check on Intralot that did not focus on Intralot, but rather “improperly” focused on other Intralot affiliates and individuals which, “pursuant to the mandates of the RFP, were expressly not to be considered in evaluating Intralot’s qualifications to be considered as the Private Manager” of the Illinois Lottery.
Suit would raise Lottery selection questions
There are other charges leveled at McCaffrey in the suit. But clearly Intralot believes the process to select the Illinois Lottery private manager was tainted. And Intralot appears determined to have the matter fully aired and ruled upon in a court of law.
If the Intralot case does make it to court, it is sure to force a lot of questionable activity related to the selection of the Illinois Lottery private manager out into the open.
Yes, this story ain’t over yet. And we never thought we’d still be saying that more than a year after the story, with all its twists and turns, was supposed to have been over.
Contact Lewis Lazare at LewisL3@aol.com
