Officials Impeded Boston Dig Probe

What a surprise ---- not.



U.S. National - AP
AP
Judge: Officials Impeded Boston Dig Probe

1 hour, 20 minutes ago



BOSTON - An investigation of tunnel leaks in the Big Dig highway project was repeatedly hindered by officials of the top contractor and the state agency that manages it, says the retired judge who led the probe.

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Related Links
• The Big Dig - official site
• Beyond the Big Dig (Boston Globe)


State officials had too close a relationship with the private contractor, said retired probate court Judge Edward M. Ginsburg.

"They were all married to each other," he told The Boston Globe.

The leak probe was part of a larger investigation overseen by Ginsburg into cost overruns in the Big Dig, which initially was expected to cost about $2.5 billion and wound up costing $14.6 billion. Officials have produced no firm estimate of cost overruns, but state auditor Joseph DeNucci has said his office has documented $600 million in waste.

A report by Ginsburg claims that officials of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority stopped cooperating after Sept. 15, when a large leak flooded an Interstate 93 tunnel and caused a huge traffic jam.

Ginsburg's team soon discovered hundreds of smaller leaks, but Turnpike Authority officials and officials of design and construction contractor Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff refused to respond to requests for more up-to-date documentation, he said in the report.

Turnpike Authority spokesman Doug Hanchett denied there was any attempt to withhold information.

"Judge Ginsburg wrote a letter claiming he didn't get some things, and we are remedying that," Hanchett said.

Keith S. Sibley, program manager for Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, also denied that investigators were refused any documents, but said he did recall two letters from Ginsburg complaining about lack of access to records.

"That's the first time I knew they asked for a couple of things, so we furnished them what was in those letters," Sibley said.

Ginsburg was named to head the cost recovery team in January 2003 because a previous team, made up of Big Dig and federal officials, met only sporadically and got back less than $36,000.

Ginsburg, who is being replaced by the state attorney general, has himself been criticized for recovering only about $4 million. The judge says he has filed 10 lawsuits, including one seeking $100 million from Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff.