The Director General of the Los Angeles Ministry of Water and Energy asked the public service board of directors to spend about $ 700,000 on private security for herself, citing a threat increased after the palisades fire.
The board of directors of five water and electricity members will decide on Tuesday to approve it from the one -year private security contract for the CEO and chief engineer, Janisse Quiñones.
In the wake of the palisades fire, the DWP was criticized for a drop in water pressure in certain fire terminals and for the Santa Ynez tank seated empty for almost a year while waiting for an estimated repair of around $ 130,000.
Quiñones, who took office as general manager of the largest municipal service in the country in May, was the subject of more and more personal attacks online which attacked a salary of $ 750,000 and denigrated it as a “hiring of Dei” for its Puerto Rican roots.
Quiñones addressed some of the comments on its history at a meeting of the DWP commission last month, suggesting that his criticism had ignored his qualifications in order to feed a program. She highlighted her decades in emergency management for the American Coast Guard.
“Not only am I 20 years older to serve this country, but I also have a mechanical engineering diploma that I graduated with honors. I have two graduate diplomas, “she said. “And I like to find difficult jobs, and it’s difficult work.”
Quiñones’ salary is in accordance with the salaries of senior managers of the Omaha Public Power public district in Nebraska and the municipal district of public services in Sacramento, according to public archives.
A DWP spokesperson said the public service had started to request private security proposals to protect the Quiñones before the January 7 fire. At that time, companies in the United States began to stimulate security after the director general of Unitedhealthcare was killed outside a New York hotel in December.
In the days following the excavation, vitriol against it intensified.
Public service said that he “received many threats” from Quiñones’s personal security, adding that some “required direct intervention by the police.” The nature of these threats and the “intervention” of the police is not clear. DWP officials did not develop, but a spokesman said: “All threats were reported to the LAPD.” Police officials also refused to disclose details on alleged threats.
“We are not starting potential threats or current surveys,” said Jennifer Forkish, director of LAPD communications.
A spokesperson for a county prosecutor said that no cases had been presented to the office relating to the threats to the Quiñones. A spokesperson for City Atty. Hydee Feldstein-Soto did not respond if charges of offense have been deposited.
Under the instant agreement before the DWP commissioners appointed by the mayor, the Quiñones would receive protection against Pinkerton Consulting & Investigations, with at least one designated armed security officer and a driver.
The contract, which would authorize up to $ 703,577 in expenses, was issued on a single basis, although DWP said it has received two other much more expensive proposals.
The company “will provide security agents trained in personal security, defensive tactics, travel safety and surveillance as needed”, according to a memo on the agreement. Company agents have military or surveillance history, including special forces.
The transition to private security partially reduces pressure on the resources of the LAPD. Quiñones initially received the protection of the airport police after the palisades fire broke out. She then received a detail from the LAPD officers who also protected the firefighters at the time, Kristin Crowley, and the chief of LAPD Jim McDonnell.
California Daily Newspapers
