WASHINGTON – After Hurricane Maria damaged tens of thousands of homes in Puerto Rico, a newly created Florida company won more than $30 million in federal contracts to provide emergency tarps and plastic sheeting for repairs.
Bronze Star LLC, which is based in St. Cloud, never delivered those urgently needed supplies.
Bronze Star was awarded contracts with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to deliver 475,000 tarps by Nov. 4, FEMA acting press secretary Jenny Burke said.
According to SunBiz.org, Kayon Jones filed articles of organization with the Florida Division of Corporations for Bronze Star, LLC earlier this year. He listed the same St. Cloud address that is listed in the Federal Emergency Management Agency contract with Bronze Star.
The fact that the company was new did not come into play when FEMA selected the company for the contract, Burke said.
"Regulation requires the government to neither prefer, nor hold against a company its 'newness' to federal contracts, and requires that the lowest price, technically acceptable bid be selected," Burke said.
News 6 visited the address on Pine Tree Drive in St. Cloud and discovered a home with a dump trailer and a moving truck parked in the driveway.
When reached by phone, Jones would not discuss the contract.
"I'm not saying anything until I talk to my lawyer," Jones said.
According to an exclusive Associated Press report, FEMA terminated the contracts with Bronze Star this month, without paying any money, and re-started the process to supply more tarps for the U.S. territory.
The original effort took nearly four weeks between the day FEMA awarded the contracts to Bronze Star and the day it canceled them, tying up millions in disaster relief funds.
FEMA officials said Bronze Star did not deliver a single tarp to Puerto Rico.
Thousands of Puerto Ricans remain homeless, and many complain the federal government is taking too long to install tarps. FEMA officials said the agency has delivered more than 110,000 tarps to survivors across the island.