Bullpucky: FG SQUARED Uses Social Media to Shake Down the City of Austin

It's no secret that the City of Austin's website needs a revamp; not just for cosmetic purposes, but to make it useful and responsive to community needs. So it was with good intentions that the City's Web group put together a proposal to engage a local (or not) Web company to redesign the site.

The first RFP was rough, vague, and came in with bids that were either astronomical or too idealistic. It was scrapped. A second RFP went out. It suffered the same fate. After all, the economy hadn't begun to backslide. The best Web companies had no real incentive to deal with the bureaucracy. The companies that did wanted to be well-compensated for their time, and the City simply could not afford that.

So, the City Web team decided to do the work in-house. They brought on consultants and contractors. They gave well publicized town hall meetings to collect feedback. In the middle of this, the City’s CTO was being investigated for the misuse of city resources. He was never officially charged because he resigned and left confusion in his wake.

So the leader of the Plone brigade had left, yet the City had held several trainings for the roughly 100 departments that would use the tool. The internal website was already on Plone, and as it stood, the resources allocated to both external and internal Plone development could just about keep pace.

The City had to create a new RFP. They knew they would start at a disadvantage. Some team members couldn’t even answer why they were using Plone, other than it would be too costly to unmake the decision now. They took the lessons they'd learned from the first two RFPs and put together something most experienced people might generously call “not the greatest RFP ever.”

The City attempted to publicize the RFP through the usual channels. If they had a name or number for a developer, they gave it a try. But bear in mind, not just anyone can build a government website. There are issues of privacy and security: people aren't just ordering dresses, they're looking up court dates and property taxes. Security is more than just a matter of expertise. For example, procedures also demand to know "what Web firms will be around at the end of this 2 to 3 year process?"

In other words, City RFPs, like all government RFPs, are minefields. It is important to write them as fairly and as openly as possible without leaving room for abuse.

So in come three bids. Ostensibly, they look similar, but Cignex Technologies, Inc. of California has lots of experience with Plone. Some of the people who designed Plone work there. Plone is what the City needs and they know how to deliver. Sounds like the start of a beautiful relationship. That their bid came in at just over half the price of the others didn't hurt either. And, to make this a perfect storm, the economy has flattened.

The Austin City Council was set to vote on whether to take this lower priced bid—it is their job to spend the taxpayer's money responsibly. But then came the Facebook group.

“Keep the City of Austin in AUSTIN!!!!!” It pleads. It even highlights the famous frog that no Californian could ever understand. It's all very pro-Austin with a 'yeah we can do this, fight the man!' spirit; until, that is, you do a little digging.

The creator of the group? David Lee. Sounds like a nice guy and someone you'd like to meet. He'd be interested to talk to because he's the "Sr. Web strategist at FG2 with visual design background. [His] specialty is on eCommerce design but [he has] lately been fascinated w/Social Media.” FG2 as in bid twice as much and didn't get the contract FG2? Yeah, that one.

Oh but that's not all. Read the comments, all of them. You can play a drinking game guessing who's an actual outraged citizen or who’s yet another FG2 employee handing out pitchforks to the community and encouraging them to storm (virtually, of course) the City Council chambers.

Among the comments is the strong voice of Courtney Steen, who calls to the Facebook crowd like Braveheart, "NOW we have to continue the movement! It (sic) we let this go on for 24 hours to let the City know we won't stand for the Californians to redesign the website then disappear once they DELAY the vote, they'll think this was a fluke or a popular fly-by-night trendy movement. We have to continue to give updates and keep the pressure on the City Council to re-open the bidding process or do whatever we decide we want them to do. Now is when we get ORGANIZED."

Organized? To what end and for the benefit of whom? For the benefit of the citizens who would benefit by having their taxes raised to pay for the super-sized bid?

And just who is Courtney Steen? Is she just an idealistic, excited girl off the street interested in having any Austin-based Web company create the City website? Sadly no. I bet you can guess the name of the company she works for. No? Here’s a clue: starts with an F and a G!

What these and other FG2 employees are doing is manipulating the social media to fool the citizenry into helping them perpetrate political blackmail. Think about this: FG2 wants you to spend that $600k extra on them. And the change orders they warn of? Oh, they do them too. Every company does.

If this was really a grass roots protest, it would be great. It's sad to see it for what it is: FG2-sponsored outrage. It's cheating. Sour grapes. Bad losers.