Raleigh mayor now working for company that got $6M city contract. No conflict, she says.
Raleigh Mayor Mary-Ann Baldwin began interviewing for her new job with a construction company nine days after the company received a $6.3 million city contract, she and a company official said this week.
The job change and its timing has some of the mayor’s frequent critics calling it a conflict of interest. Baldwin says she was not yet in touch with the company when the Raleigh City Council unanimously voted on the contract.
A former five-term council member who was elected mayor in 2019, Baldwin is now director of Business Development for Barnhill Contracting Co.’s Triangle and Streamline Divisions.
She was formerly vice president at Holt Brothers Construction and executive director of the Holt Brothers Foundation, which supports children who have a parent with cancer.
In an interview Wednesday, Baldwin said her new job is similar to what she did at Holt Brothers. Her first official day was May 18, she said, and the news was shared by the company in a tweet and press release Tuesday.
Barnhill has worked on local development projects that include the Raleigh Convention Center, the North Carolina Museum of Art, the Wake County Justice Center and The Dillon, a mixed-use project in downtown’s Warehouse District.
Lowest of six bids
On March 3, the City Council approved a $6.3 million contract with Barnhill for street resurfacing. It was the lowest of six bids, and it was approved unanimously by the council’s eight members, including the mayor.
At the time of the vote, Baldwin said, she had not yet been approached for the job with the company.
“I was not interviewing, nor had I been contacted,” she said.
Baldwin’s first conversation with Marty Moser, senior vice president of Barnhill’s building group, was on March 12. Both he and Baldwin confirmed she met with a third-party recruiter a few days before that, but both said it was after the March 3 vote. They both declined to provide the name of the recruiter.
A second follow-up interview was held March 31, and she accepted the job in mid-April, Baldwin said.
Company leaders made campaign donations
The only concern Barnhill had about hiring an elected official like Baldwin was the time constraints, Moser said Thursday. The street resurfacing contract is in a different Barnhill division and the bidding process was sealed and transparent, he said.
“We are excited to have Mary-Ann joining our team,” Moser said. “She has tremendous experience and this is an opportunity to mentor young leaders, and we have young people in this construction business. I am personally excited to see what she brings. She is a tremendous addition to our team and brings a lot of leadership.”
Moser donated $500 to Baldwin’s mayoral campaign and Robert Barnhill Jr., chief executive officer of Barnhill, donated $1,000 to her campaign. Both donations were made in 2019.
Baldwin faced similar conflict accusations when Holt Brothers projects came up for a vote during her 10 previous years on the council.
She recused herself when Holt Brothers was bidding for a city project, she said. And she said she never worked on city of Raleigh projects while at Holt. Barnhill is not “targeting any work” with the city, Moser said.
“I have always asked to be recused,” Baldwin said. “I think that people are going to say what they are going to say. But I resent any negative insinuation about my ethics.”
The mayor and City Council posts are part-time positions with part-time salaries under $30,000.
A public records request for all current city contracts with Barnhill and Barnhill contracts approved since Baldwin was sworn-in had not been fulfilled as of Thursday morning.
Baldwin has been criticized for her ties to developers by self-described “pro-neighborhood” advocates concerned about neighborhood change. The news of her new job spread in Facebook groups dedicated to Raleigh politics, with comments by former Planning Commission member Bob Geary and former Council member Stef Mendell, among others
“I think that the mayor should resign if she wants to work for Barnhill,” Mendell said Thursday. “I don’t see how she can credibly work for Barnhill and work for the city without facing potential conflict of interests every single day. They are such a big player in this area that any rezoning, any road projects would potentially involve Barnhill.”
This story was originally published May 28, 2020 at 10:30 AM.
