City Buys $50,000 in Box Lunches for Police During Jackson Memorial
Thursday, Jan 7, 2010 | Updated 3:00 PM PDT
Los Angeles Times
The funeral procession for Michael Jackson makes its way into Staples Center in Los Angeles on July 7, 2009.
City emergency services officials followed proper procedure when they ordered $50,000 worth of box lunches from a Wrightwood restaurant for police officers deployed to the Michael Jackson memorial ceremony at Staples Center, members of a Los Angeles City Council committee said Monday.
But members of the council's Public Safety Committee directed the city controller to update policies to ensure that restaurants within the city of Los Angeles could be used in similar situations.
"We need to figure out how we can do this within the boundaries of Los Angeles," Councilman Dennis Zine said.
Councilman Paul Koretz said he believed many people at the city were surprised "that we couldn't find a vendor that was within the city of Los Angeles to do this, and do it more cheaply."
James Featherstone, general manager of the Emergency Management Department, defended the $48,826 purchase of 3,500 box lunches from Jensen's Fine Foods, saying his office did some comparison shopping, but the other two vendors on the city's procurement list charged $3 more per box lunch, which would have added $10,500 to the total bill.
He said the box lunches from Jensen's contained two sandwiches, two drinks, a bag of chips, fruit, a granola bar, a cookie and gum -- meeting state and federal guidelines for caloric value and perishability.
Also, Jensen's had a proven track record of preparing large amounts of food in a matter of hours, he said, noting that the restaurant also provided meals for emergency personnel during the Sayre Fire.
Featherstone added that he only had about 12 hours to procure the lunches because plans for the memorial were in flux for several days leading up to the event.
City Controller Wendy Greuel's chief deputy, Claire Bartels, said Featherstone and other emergency officials followed proper procedures, but she said those procedures need to be changed.
Bartels said the Jackson memorial fell somewhere between an "emergency" event and a "planned" event, but the controller's office would be glad to "fill in the policy void."
Zine and Koretz said they were surprised to hear that there were only two local vendors on the city's procurement list.
"How do we have so few options?" Koretz asked.
