It doesn’t inspire much confidence when the company that Gov. Sam Brownback’s administration hired to prevent fraud has settled a $63.7 million whistle-blower lawsuit accusing it of fraud. Kansas recently awarded Accenture an $85 million contract for a computer system to verify eligibility for Medicaid and other services, plus another $10 million a year for five years to administer the program. But whistle-blowers in Arkansas and the U.S. Justice Department accused the company of bid-rigging, taking kickbacks and fraudulently inflating the prices the government paid for computers and services. Accenture said the settlement was not an admission of guilt.
Republican Bob Turner’s upset victory in Tuesday’s race to replace Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., does not bode well for President Obama and Democrats. This is a district that Democrats have held since 1920. On the other hand, the pundits said the opposite thing in May when a Democrat won a special election in a conservative New York district.
Wichita’s unofficial keeper of what he rightly calls a “priceless asset” got his due Tuesday at the Wichita City Council, when Vice Mayor Lavonta Williams read a proclamation declaring it Philip Blake Day. Blake, an 87-year-old World War II veteran, was properly honored for his dedication to the maintenance and long-term oversight of Veterans Memorial Park and other local veterans monuments, including the World War II memorial scheduled for a ribbon-cutting Nov. 12 and a Revolutionary War monument due in 2013. As the proclamation urged, Wichitans can best honor Blake’s important legacy by lending “physical and financial support for his efforts in keeping all veteran memorials alive for generations to come.”
