Previous leaders of the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority “cherry-picked when it was convenient or not convenient” to follow state law and internal policies related to public records, procurement, and settlement agreements, state Auditor Diana DiZoglio said Monday.
DiZoglio’s office published a 45-page report about an audit it conducted at the convention center authority, which found numerous problems with policies and practices in place at the state entity that owns and operates the Hynes Convention Center, the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center, the MassMutual Center in Springfield, and the Lawn on D.
The audit covered January 1, 2021 through December 31, 2022, and extended back through January 1, 2018 to examine procurement and employee complaint practices.
Auditors said the agency in that span could not prove that it obtained sufficient quotes for several purchases, did not follow procurement policies for a media contract worth more than $100,000, struck vendor contracts without board approval, and executed a pricey employee settlement without board approval, among other things.
“Our audit found that, under prior leadership, the Convention Center cherry-picked when it was convenient or not convenient to follow public records law, Chapter 30b, alongside its own policies and procedures with regard to state procurement and contracting,” DiZoglio said in a written statement. “Deeply troubling is also the fact that prior leadership violated the law in executing a $1.2 million non-disclosure agreement — concealing allegations of racial discrimination.”
DiZoglio’s office referred several matters to other agencies for additional investigation and “potential enforcement,” including the state attorney general’s office and the State Ethics Commission, according to the report.
In response to several points, convention center authority officials said they agree with the findings and believe previous agency leadership did not appropriately follow procedures. A media consultant contract that led to more than half a million dollars in spending “was pursued as a sole source procurement by the MCCA’s prior executive director without the involvement of the procurement department,” the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority wrote in its audit response.
The “prior executive director” mentioned in in the report is David Gibbons, who began the job under then-Governor Charlie Baker in 2015 and resigned last year after a series of controversies, including an allegedly opaque process of selecting a developer for state-owned land in South Boston.
DiZoglio in her statement thanked the convention center authority’s interim executive director, Gloria Cordes Larson, “for working alongside our audit team to immediately begin addressing these and other very concerning issues identified in the report.”
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Diana DiZoglio 
