ATLANTA — The Federal Aviation Administration has threatened to pull future and retroactive funding from the City of Atlanta, finding it in violation of the terms tied to a minority contracting program.
The warning came in the form of a nearly 30-page summary from a civil rights complaint filed by a former contractor named Shelia Edwards.
Edwards was a minority partner in the Xpress Spa vendor business at Atlanta’s Airport until 2014, following a complaint she’d filed on behalf of her company, Cordial. It alleged she was being blocked from business dealings by Xpress Spa, essentially violating the terms of the federal program that led to their joint venture contract.
Edwards turned around and filed a federal lawsuit and complaints with the FAA, alleging retaliation, harassment and nepotism. In the latter claim, she says her company was used to land the contract only to be illegally replaced by friends of former Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed.
It's a fight that has already cost the city well over $1 million in legal fees.
In a decision dated Monday, the FAA’s office of Civil Rights sided with much of Edwards’ harassment and retaliation complaints, concluding she’d been terminated without proper cause.
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It goes on to demand the city come into compliance with the minority contracting program guidelines within 180 days, or risk their federal funding, both future and retroactive.
The FAA also demands the city reopen its probe into Edwards’ claims with an independent, third-party contractor. They essentially concluded the city’s own investigation could not be unbiased.
In addition to those terms, the federal government wants the city to calculate funds that may
be owed to Edwards under the original contract terms.
In a statement, a city spokesman pushed back against the FAA’s findings, saying, “The City disagrees with many of the factual findings in the initial decision and is currently evaluating all of its legal and administrative options.”
While the determination is separate from Edwards' ongoing federal claim, it will support her complaint in court.
“It was the city’s job to enforce those regulations, and they didn’t just fail, they consciously disregarded their responsibilities as the maintainer and supervisor of this program,” said Carl Gebo, Edwards’ attorney.
Gebo said taxpayers should be concerned by the mismanagement of funds and potential for it all to be pulled.
“They (taxpayers) should ask themselves, ‘What is the city doing that it could be this wrong?’”
The city has 30 days to appeal the new findings.