(Forty-fourth in a series)

by Christiaan Hart-Nibbrig

“We – I – made a mistake. We should have been looking at the contracts. We took the bait.”

– Robert E. Field, reflecting on the decision to pressure the Lancaster County Convention Center Authority to release legal invoices, instead of examining the multi-million dollar contracts the Authority had entered into with Penn Square Partners.

Opposition to the convention center project was bolstered by the selection of Pannell, Kerr, Forster (PKF) to perform the first feasibility study on the project. After PKF was chosen in mid-February 2006, many critics of the project turned their attention to the charges of the law firm at the center of virtually every aspect of this project: Stevens & Lee.

The Reading-based firm authored (and lobbied for) the 1994 Third Class Convention Center Authority Act, allowing counties to impose a five percent room rental tax on all county hotels and motels in order to build convention centers. This tax generated about three million dollars per year for the Lancaster County Convention Center Authority (LCCCA).

Stevens & Lee is also the registered lobbyist for High Industries, the parent company of High Associates, the general partner of Penn Square Partners.

At the time the LCCCA was established in September, 1999, John Espenshade, a Stevens & Lee partner, was simultaneously the Lancaster County solicitor and the solicitor for the LCCCA. Stevens & Lee occupied the same dual role in Berks, Luzerne, and Erie counties when those counties built controversial publicly financed convention center projects.

Additionally, Stevens & Lee attorneys represented about one-third of the county’s outside “special counsel” work, and received the attorneys’ fees for the sale of Conestoga View. Espenshade himself was involved with the preliminary negotiations between Commissioners Shellenberger and Shaub regarding the nursing home transaction. (The Conestoga View issue proves to be so politically devastating that Commissioner Shaub will quit before his term ends; Shellenberger decides not to run again; and Henderson is trounced in her re-election bid and sues Lancaster Newspapers for libel related to the Conestoga View coverage.)

The Lancaster offices of Stevens & Lee are even located in Fulton Bank, then a limited partner in the convention center project.

It was especially the firm’s role as LCCCA solicitor that drew the attention of project critics.

By 2006, Stevens & Lee had billed (and been paid by) the LCCCA more than six million dollars. Every single one of the more than 200 invoices was devoid of itemized detail with respect to the work performed. Each invoice simply read:

“For professional services rendered on behalf of the Lancaster County Convention Center Authority.”

In December of 2005, Robert Field launched Newslanc.com. This writer worked as its first news editor. On the site, which was updated daily, Field wrote a “Watch Dog” column, in which he would  discuss and often praise or criticize local items published in the Lancaster newspapers, with particular attention given to the convention center issue.

NewsLanc newsletters were handed out at the popular Lancaster Central Market, baseball games, and other county events that attracted large crowds. (Field often joined in handing out the fliers, something he still does today.)

Field, an experienced political activist, also ran lively, often pointed, radio spots for NewsLanc at popular Lancaster stations.

Through the Pennsylvania Right to Know law, NewsLanc obtained the invoices for the Stevens & Lee LCCCA billings. There were 228 invoices ranging in amounts from less than one hundred dollars to more than $100,000.

Field analyzed the numbers and concluded that Stevens & lee would have had to have multiple  personnel working full-time on the project to come up with the amount being charged, which he believe was inconceivable.

To Field, in the early months of 2006, the seemingly cavalier withholding of normal billing procedures was a red flag, and he was determined to get the itemized invoices released. “I took the bait,” he says today.

Joining Field in aggressively questioning the Stevens & Lee invoices were the three new county-appointed members of the LCCCA board of directors.

Laura Douglas, Deb Hall, and Jack Craver – three strong, independent personalities — had already revealed their disenchantment with the project by the time they began asking about the attorneys’ fees. In early January, 2006, only months after being appointed to the board, the three convened a large public meeting to air out questions about the project. More than 200 people attended the meeting.

Now, Douglas, Hall, and Craver were asking about the invoices at board meetings.

“The issue with the Stevens & Lee bills for me was that it seemed like a lot of money was being paid for this work,” says Douglas today. “I wanted a ’spot forensic’ to see if the work we were being charged took that amount of time. But we couldn’t get any answers from Ted.”

‘Ted’ was Ted Darcus, the imperious chairman of the LCCCA board, who consistently and often rudely denied the public and even board members access to itemizations supporting the invoices, saying they contained confidential information and would not be available as long as there was ongoing litigation.

In June of 2006, Deb Hall, whose day job was then president of the Ephrata Chamber of Commerce and who was a former paralegal, introduced a resolution to hire an independent legal auditor to review the Stevens & Lee bills. The proposal was voted down by the majority of the LCCCA board.

It seemed the entire opposition to the project was focused on the Stevens & Lee invoices. Former Lancaster city councilman, Luis Mendoza, wrote (with Field’s assistance) multiple letters to the editor and appeared at LCCCA board meetings demanding the full release of the invoices.

The always entertaining Ron Harper, Jr., in his inimitable fashion, also demanded the bills release. Harper appeared at LCCCA meetings with a large cardboard cutout of Espenshade. Harper would make his remarks with his arm around “Flat John,” as he asked the non-responsive Espenshade about the bills during the public comment portion of the meetings. This never failed to garner laughs, even from Darcus and other project supporters.

Craver, the former general manager of New York’s Plaza Hotel, had written a published letter to the editor to one of the Lancaster Newspapers in which he criticizes the project’s lack of a feasibility study, financing, and the administration of the LCCCA board under Darcus. Craver copied his letter to the Governor and Attorney General.

What Field, the dissident LCCCA board members, and others questioning the Stevens & Lee bills did not know at the time, but subsequently learned, was that the firm had personnel working full-time on the project, and were its de facto developers and managers.

The time and energy the opponents to the convention center project devoted to the Stevens & Lee invoices was misplaced. During this period, the first six months of 2006, important contracts were being drafted, and they were being made without scrutiny.

Several-hundred page of agreements were dropped off with LCCCA board members with only a couple of days for close reading before voting. Both Douglas and Hall routinely had their own 45+ hour work weeks around which they had to schedule LCCCA duties including, on this occasion,  analysis of the complex legal and financial documents.

Key agreements concerning bond financing; architectural design; shared space between the hotel and convention center; naming rights; permit waivers; consultant contracts; demolition of historic property and others were rammed through by Darcus with the votes of the other three city appointees over the pleas for more time to review by the county appointed minority.  Thereafter, the agreements were overlooked as the opposition focused its limited resources on the Stevens & Lee invoices.

Robert Field, with a well-earned reputation for unsparing and often harsh criticism of the foibles of others, is equally blunt with his self appraisal:

“The big mistake was that we did not voice objections at the very next meeting after having thoroughly reviewed the one-sided agreements. Instead we took the Stevens and Lee invoices bait!

“We [the opposition's leading figures] were all working independently and were not even necessarily congenial. There were no gatherings to discuss what we should do, no lawyers or public relations consultants to guide us, no word coming down from the top…

“The Stevens & Lee invoices issue seemed to suggest ongoing corruption as did the almost million dollars paid to Daniel Logan for services that remain obscure. It took until the end of litigation and the obtaining of the data behind the invoices before we recognized that Stephens and Lee with other high priced consultants were actually running the show on a daily basis.  It helped explain whyTed Darcus and David Hixson would not allow discussions at the meetings.  They were but bystanders!”

If the sponsors “out-smarted” Field and other critics, they were richly rewarded for their efforts. The agreements that were passed without close examination put a lot of money into the sponsors’ pockets, money that came mostly from county and state taxpayers.

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Chapter Forty-five: January thru June 2006 TimeLine