On Thursday, State Senator Annette Taddeo (D-Miami) requested the Senate Committee on Infrastructure and Security to hold hearings on SunPass and its troubled contractor following the decision made by the Secretary of Transportation Kevin Thibault to not renew the SunPass contract with Conduent.
“The problems caused by Conduent’s ongoing system failures were extensive – including contractual breaches, mismanagement, oversight issues, billing issues, customer data safety, amongst others,” said Senator Taddeo. “The magnitude of their multiple breakdowns cannot be ignored. In order to get to the bottom of these problems and ensure that the same mistakes are not made again, we have an obligation to hold hearings and investigate how things went so wrong.”
Senator Taddeo sent the letter to Senate Committee Chairman Tom Lee yesterday, emphasizing the importance of deciphering the myriad of problems that have surfaced with SunPass, FDOT, and Conduent. “We must perform our oversight function as Senators,” she added.
While the Department of Transportation announced that the Conduent contract will not be renewed, the company will still remain as the SunPass contractor through 2022, allowing it to collect millions of dollars in taxpayer funds. Without such an investigation, Senator Taddeo warned, the state remained vulnerable to Conduent’s ongoing failures, and the apparent lack of sufficient oversight by DOT to prevent or quickly correct them.
“This contract has been plagued by problems from the beginning,” said Senator Taddeo. “We need to fully understand how a company with such a dubious track record was selected in the first place, and why accountability for its terrible performance was not demanded sooner. Anything less risks not only the taxpayers’ money, but the performance of Florida’s transportation system both now and in the future. This cannot be allowed to happen again.”
