Faulty water pumps in New Orleans built by former Jeb Bush partner (Bush-El water pump co., '89-'94)

seafan

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Tue Mar-13-07 10:43 PM
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Faulty water pumps in New Orleans built by former Jeb Bush partner (Bush-El water pump co., '89-'94)

There are lots of very shady business dealings involving Jeb Bush that have, rather conveniently, managed thus far to avoid much scrutiny. This is just one of them.

Corps placed faulty pumps in New Orleans

3/13/2007, 10:24 p.m. CDT
By CAIN BURDEAU
The Associated Press

NEW ORLEANS (AP) � The Army Corps of Engineers, rushing to meet President Bush's promise to protect New Orleans by the start of the 2006 hurricane season, installed defective flood-control pumps last year despite warnings from its own expert that the equipment would fail during a storm, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press.
The 2006 hurricane season turned out to be mild, and the new pumps were never pressed into action. But the Corps and the politically connected manufacturer of the equipment are still struggling to get the 34 heavy-duty pumps working properly.

The pumps are now being pulled out and overhauled because of excessive vibration, Corps officials said. Other problems have included overheated engines, broken hoses and blown gaskets, according to the documents obtained by the AP.

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The drainage-canal pumps were custom-designed and built under a $26.6 million contract awarded after competitive bidding to Moving Water Industries Corp. of Deerfield Beach, Fla. It was founded in 1926 and supplies flood-control and irrigation pumps all over the world.
MWI is owned by J. David Eller and his sons. Eller was once a business partner of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush in a venture called Bush-El that marketed MWI pumps. And Eller has donated about $128,000 to politicians, the vast majority of it to the Republican Party, since 1996, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

MWI has run into trouble before. The U.S. Justice Department sued the company in 2002, accusing it of fraudulently helping Nigeria obtain $74 million in taxpayer-backed loans for overpriced and unnecessary water-pump equipment. The case has yet to be resolved.

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Misgivings about the pumps were chronicled in a May 2006 memo provided to the AP by Matt McBride, a mechanical engineer and flooded-out Katrina victim who, like many in New Orleans, has been closely watching the rebuilding of the city's flood defenses.
The memo was written by Maria Garzino, a Corps mechanical engineer overseeing quality assurance at an MWI test site in Florida. The Corps confirmed the authenticity of the 72-page memo, which details many of the mechanical problems and criticizes the testing procedures used.

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After Katrina, Congress gave the corps $5.7 billion to make New Orleans safe from hurricanes. The Corps rushed to fix broken levees and floodwalls and make good on Bush's promise that the city would be protected "better than pre-Katrina by June 1."

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http://www.sptimes.com/2002/03/15/State/US_fraud_suit_targets.shtml"> U.S. fraud suit targets ex-partner of Jeb Bush

By ADAM C. SMITH, Times Political Editor
� St. Petersburg Times
published March 15, 2002

Gov. Jeb Bush's former business partner in a venture to sell water pumps abroad defrauded the U.S. government of more than $74-million, federal authorities contend in a lawsuit.
The Justice Department alleges that MWI Corp. of Deerfield Beach, a water pump company whose equipment Bush marketed to foreign countries, fraudulently helped Nigeria obtain U.S. taxpayer-backed loans during his father's administration.

Much of the loan money went for secret payoffs to Nigerian officials and equipment that was vastly overpriced and unneeded, the lawsuit says.
The company denies the allegations, many of which surfaced four years ago when a former MWI employee sued the company.

Bush, campaigning for governor at the time, shrugged off questions about the deal as little more than complaints from a disgruntled former staffer.

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In 1989, Eller, a major Republican contributor, formed a company with Bush, Bush-El, to market MWI's industrial water pumps abroad. Bush has described Eller as a "person of integrity."
Twice while his father was in the White House, Bush visited Nigeria as a water pump representative. He visited Nigerian dignitaries and was showered with attention, including a parade for him in 1989 with 1,300 horses.

Jeb Bush sold his share in Bush-El in 1994, and has said he earned about $648,000 from the company.

He has insisted that he received no money on the Nigerian deals, saying he took no commissions on sales backed by U.S. loans to avoid a potential conflict of interest. He said his earnings came from his work in other countries, including Mexico, Indonesia and Malaysia, but in 1998 declined to detail that work.

"You either trust me or you don't," he told the Miami Herald in 1998.

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