The chairperson of the Bridge Center Board for Hope is defending her agency’s refusal to make public a lease agreement with Collis Temple Jr., who owns the building at 3455 Florida Blvd. that will house the new taxpayer-funded psychiatric stabilization and detox center.
Kathy Kliebert acknowledges the lack of transparency surrounding the lease doesn’t look good. But she says the Bridge Center board itself hasn’t even seen the lease, which was privately negotiated between the company that will operate the facility—RI International—and Temple’s firm, Human Resource Group.
“We want to be as transparent as we can but we don’t have the lease,” Kliebert says. “We understand the optics. But we know what the amount is. We have to trust the vendor we selected. They do this in a number of other states. We are respecting the decision of our contractor.”
While the general terms of the lease have been made public—$1.1 million over five years, or, $220,000 per year—The Advocate was denied a public records request seeking a final copy of the lease agreement.
The Bridge Center is funded by a dedicated 1.5-mil property tax that will generate some $6 million a year.
In January, the Bridge Center board, on the recommendation of RII, voted to locate the new facility in Temple’s building. At the time, board members said Temple’s 25,600-square-foot building had more usable space and would cost 50% less than nearby Baton Rouge General’s Mid City campus, long considered the favorite for the facility.
Temple was a member of the Bridge Center board at the time. He has since resigned to avoid a conflict of interest.
Reached this morning by Daily Report, Temple said he has nothing to hide and sees no reason not to share the lease with the public.
“I think it is only fair because all of this involves public tax funds and we all have a fiduciary responsibility to be transparent as we move forward with the potential of these public funds,” he says.
He did not immediately release a copy of the lease, however, saying he wanted to check first with the Bridge Center board and RII officials.
Bridge Center attorney Murphy Foster III says it’s important to understand that the lease is not a public document. RII has a contract with the Bridge Center to operate the facility, which includes entering into leases and contracts with landlords, vendors and health care providers, none of which has to be made public.
“Do you think you’re entitled to see the contracts RII enters into with its doctors? How is that any less important than their lease?” he says. “We, as the Bridge Center, don’t contract with those entities. We contract with one entity.”
Kliebert says the board has asked RII for a copy of the lease and the firm declined to provide it. Asked if she would consider ramping up pressure on the firm should public clamor grow over the issue, she says, “Of course, but they are doing what they do in other states and we have to trust them.”
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