A resolution approving a proposed Agreement between the City and County of Denver and Universal Protection Service, L.P. d/b/a Allied Universal Security Services, LP for security personnel at homeless shelters and facilities during the COVID-19 health crisis. Approves a contract with Universal Protection Service, L.P., doing business as Allied Universal Security Services, for $4,000,000 and through 6-01-20 with the option to extend through 9-30-20 to provide security services at the National Western Complex and the Denver Coliseum in response to the COVID-19 pandemic (GENRL-202054453). The last regularly scheduled Council meeting within the 30-day review period is on 5-18-20. Councilmember Black approved filing this item on 4-30-20.
Thank you, Councilmember. All right. Singular comments on this one. Madam Secretary, please put the next item on our screen. Councilmember Torres, would you please put Council Resolution 416 on. Approving Council Resolution 20 416 to adopt this? Thank you. It has been moved and seconded. We're going to be questions or comments by members of council members and must be sent up for vote. Yes. Thank you, Mr. President. I've called this one out for a vote because I raised concerns several times about contracting with this company. They've been in the media multiple times and most recently for a brutal beating of a constituent in Union Station. I have a letter here that I think captures most of my reasons for calling this out and voting no. I believe it was sent to other council members, but I think it's important to get it on the record. This came from the Greater Denver Ministerial Alliance, and it reads as such Dear Denver City Council members, I'm writing this letter to express my disapproval and objection to City Council awarding universal protection services, doing business as allied universal security. A contract for $4 million to provide security for homeless shelters at National Western Complex in response to COVID 19 pandemic. Our community has reported multiple grievances against what we believe are racial profiling practices against African-Americans by allied universal security guards throughout the RTT system. Most egregious was two years ago, when Allied universal security guards in the RTD Union Station terminal viciously beat Rivero Stinnett, a local Denver artist, while he waited after midnight to catch a train home. He sustained injuries so severe that they have permanently affected his life. We do not trust allied security to fairly and respectfully protect our most vulnerable community members, especially with the heightened stress of COVID 19 pandemic. We respectfully request the Denver City Council to decline this contract and seek other agencies to perform security. Respectfully, Bishop Jerry Demmer, I am in full agreement with this. I believe that we are signing up for a liability with this company. They are still in litigation on this particular case, and there have been other cases. And I believe that if we open the doors to a company that has known harms against specifically our homeless and black and brown community, we are not doing our city any justice. And I request that we decline this contract and go back to the drawing board with other individuals who can provide security for this complex during this very sensitive time. Thank you, Mr. President. Councilmember next up, Councilman Ryan's. Thinking as president. I am guessing that no one is here representing our universal credit protection services or universal protection services. And I would say that the letter is troubling, and I'm not sure exactly what to do without any sort of response or or the ability to provide a response. So I think this by the way, this. Thank you, Councilmember. Next up, Councilmember Ortega. Is Brennan still in the room? Brendan Henry. Yeah. Yes, he is. Okay. Brennan Can you tell us just based on kind of where we're at and the fact that we're looking at a safer to safer at home model after the eighth? How much longer we anticipate having the National Western and the Coliseum shelters open? Same with the hotels. I'm real concerned about what are we going to do next? Where where will these people go, especially some of those who are sick? Because that ties back into Councilwoman CdeBaca question about, you know, how long will it take to find somebody else different, to do the security at this location? You know, the Microsoft. Their lessons are there. And you got to speak real close. Really? Yeah. Brendan Hanlon So Chief Financial Officer comes home and I'm going to get you some additional information. I wasn't prepared to talk about that today. Our guys here to talk about that. Okay. Thank you. I asked the wrong person. Okay. And can we delay what the Department of General Services is available to? I'm sorry. I was having trouble and muting. So Skye Stuart Mayor's office again Cammy is on from general services and can speak more specifically to the contact details of this. To your question about how long this will go on, we don't have an answer to that yet. This contract runs through June 1st and that is what we're anticipating for the moment. But as we're evaluating things, we will continue to look at that. Many of the hotel contracts we have have rolling options throughout the rest of the summer that we can execute as we go along. So we'll continue to evaluate the situation on the ground. As you said, the safer at home orders come into place. But we don't have a definitive time frame for when we will rule on those, meaning the use of artillery shelters, where the hotels are looking at currently providing services at least through the end of May. Okay. And tell me, since you're on the line, can you tell us what the process was to make the selection of this company over any of the others that are available in the Denver community? Absolutely. Councilwoman Ortega, thank you very much for the question. So we were just to give you a little bit of context of timeline of of what occurred with the security specifically at National Western. General Services was pulled into that discussion on April 11 and asked to provide security. So on April 11, we were able to assemble a small team of security agents who were able to provide that. The post at National Western. It's been a very small or it was a very small contingent of security officers that cover that post through the 23rd. And they were not able to fully meet the capacity of the needs at the national national Western complex. And also, they were not able to meet the the requirements of the Denver Coliseum, which opened on April 20th. So we had to take within within about nine days from the 11th to the 20th, which was, again, the Coliseum opening to look for qualifications and quotes from different vendors in the Denver area as well as the as Colorado. We reached out specifically to ten vendors and we got proposals back from from those folks. And the only the only security company that was able to meet the city's needs and the most immediate needs was Allied Universal. We've met extensively with them. They are providing security services under a purchase order currently at the National Western Center, as well as the Denver Coliseum, until we could get this contract through the city council. We met with them extensively to discuss the services that are being provided there and the training that's being provided. And I've been on site pretty routinely to check in with all of the with the project managers. So there's a dedicated project manager that is on site working between those sites. There's extensive supervision within the site. And these are unique sites. And I'm sure that you all have have been out or had the opportunity to go out. But there are a lot of different people that are at these sites. So there's a tremendous amount of oversight, whether that is our partner providers, the Colorado Rangers are providing some security as well, daytime hours, as well as the Denver Police Department, which are primarily on the exterior of the facilities, but just to create a secure and safe environment for the residents that are coming into both of the shelters. And under this contract. How many employees does this include? So each of these shelters has 11 staff on it at any eight hour shift. So really, you're looking at, you know, somewhere between 30 and 40 that are dedicated to each each shelter. Plus, again, as I mentioned, supervisory staff as well as the project manager. So those are additions. So was the staffing part of the the issue that we looked at in terms of of trying to meet that demand immediately? That is correct. That's absolutely correct. Our current contractor, HFCS, which we would have liked to have continued working with them, they just simply didn't have the capacity as well as the fact that since our city facilities are going to be reopening and and getting back up to sort of the capacity that we were there, they couldn't necessarily provide the service that we needed. And they're also providing some of that security at the respite locations that were mentioned before this restroom. Great. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you. I want to go to Councilmember Tourism. I've got a view on this issue. Actually, go ahead. Thank you so much. So that line of questioning makes me feel like this is an impossible situation because there's only one agency qualified and. There are even more. So the. Review and the approval of this contract. Really increase. From the purchasing department, city and county. Facilities. Camden County victims did. Do you know or does anyone know. What the lawsuit just concluded? I guess. Did that come up at all in the vetting of the agency? Thank you for the question, Kaplan Torres. So we did we meaning myself and Chief Security Officer George Hunt had a conversation with the startup team that was assigned to this project and brought our concerns to their attention. They did assure us that that would not be the case and that that is not the the organization that is that is Allied Universal. But we we were concerned and rightfully so, and knew that this would be a question that we were asked. And we wanted to do our our due diligence and ensure that we were employing the correct staff at these locations, because we're extremely committed to providing a safe and secure environment to these individuals. And I've spent a lot of time in the shelters recently and and certainly have a newfound respect for for the individuals there, as well as our partner providers. We did a background check or not necessarily a background check, but let me step back. We requested the names of all of the agency agents that would be assigned to either shelter. And then we ran them through a check with access and license to ensure that the guards didn't have any sort of history , that perhaps, you know, perhaps they somehow slipped through slipped through the background, normal sort of background checks that that were required or that allied universal requires. And so all of those checks came back negative or came back that there weren't any sort of issues with with the agents. Allied has done extensive training with them because obviously this is a very sensitive population. And and we had a lot of conversation about that before before bringing them on board. And then also specifically within the women's shelter at the Coliseum, the partner provider, I believe Catholic Charities also did about a 40 minute specialized training with all of the agents assigned there to talk about the specific sort of trauma and issues that the women and transit transgender population encounter in a homeless sort of situation. And so that each of those agents went through that training with our partner provider. And and I think that that was definitely, definitely helpful. Now just one more question. How long is the purchase. Order been in place from the. I'm sorry. I had a hard time hearing you. How long have the purchase orders in place? Without. With Allied forces. They began working at the Colosseum whenever it opened on April 20th, and then they transitioned to the National Western Center on the 24th. So HSF was there until the 23rd and the transition happened on I believe that was Friday the 24th. I'm sorry. One last. One. What is the procedure at the National. Security Center if. Any of the guests have an issue with a security guard? Do they take that to. Sure. So if any of the residents and I believe this was your your question any of the residents had an issue with the security guard. Where could they take that? So obviously, there are several supervisors with Allied that are on site. However, someone may not be comfortable with that situation, so they can really go to any one of the providers that are at the location there. I think, you know, Denver Rescue Mission is the primary provider there. But I know that there are some other contract type work that, you know, being in that setting, people get to know one another. And so Aramark and some other. So they could potentially take it to any of those individuals if it if they had an issue over at the Coliseum, I believe. There are several different partner providers. Catholic Charities, I think, is the main one. And then there are several others that they could take concerns to. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, back to council, Eduardo. Just a comment and a question. This is a case that was pretty high profile because of the permanent brain damage sustained on video. And so it's hard for me to wrap my head around the city going with this provider, knowing what happened in this case. Even from an outsider's perspective. I would like some answers about some things you mentioned. You said that HFCS cannot meet the requirements. Can you explain to me what the requirements are for this contract and for this specific site, if the site was what made it more cumbersome? Sure. Absolutely. The the. Thank you for the question, Councilwoman CdeBaca. I certainly hear you. And that's really the issue with HFCS is one of capacity. So they as I mentioned before, they were only able to provide about half of the capacity that we needed at National Western. And even that was a bit of a challenge where we would typically have ten or 11 staffed for an individual shift. They were coming up with only about five security guards that could cover that shift. So we were asking them to cover city facilities as well as these rested hotel rooms in addition to National Western. And I did understand that whenever we asked HFCs to come in and assist us on that, you know, April 11 two with security services, that that was very much a temporary sort of arrangement and that we would very soon after that has to figure out something that was a bit more long term meaning could sustain us through potentially June or maybe, you know, into September if need be. So really, HSF was one of capacity. What is what are the other requirements? Do they need to be armed or do they need some kind of specific certification? What are the other requirements around who can who can do this work? Absolutely. So we did require a merchant guard license issued by the city and county of Denver. So we require that of anyone perform it performing security services for the city. We also required that that we have a heavy focus on men agents at the National Western Complex and female agents at the Denver Coliseum. We wanted to create a safe environment for those individuals and felt very strongly that men should be at the men's shelter and women should be at the women's shelter. And and it's balancing out rather nicely. As far as the orange piece is concerned, absolutely none of our guards at either one of the locations are armed. We did have one. And I just I want to be very transparent on this. We did have one armed guard with us that works for that period of the 11 through the 23rd. He was a supervisor. He was the first one on on the property on the 11th whenever we needed assistance. And he actually did a really fantastic job. He worked the overnight shift and was able to bond with the residents and had a really good rapport with them. However, he's with HSF, so now he is back in the city facilities providing providing work. So we have absolutely no armed staff, allied staff. And if I could just share here quickly as well that it is very much an observe and report situation. There is never and whenever we sent out a request for for qualifications and quotes, it was a strict no contact, no touch sort of security position. So so it is observe and report. There is never to be any sort of physical engagement with anyone that is any of the residents. That's what our partner providers are for or that they are there to engage and to calm and to de-escalate and to assist the residents with any sort of issues that they may be encountering . And so do you know if the the officers who are in litigation right now with us, do you know if they had any of these red flags on their record prior? And is is that. I mean, if they didn't have these things red flags on their record prior, they would be like anyone else. We're setting up in this position and could potentially have situations where these guards are doing the same thing that those guards did. So do we know if there were red flags on the other officers record? I do not know that. I can certainly ask that question of Allied I and I do. I do understand your concern, and this was definitely a concern that myself and the chief security officer had. And again, we spoke extensively with, you know, with Allied before moving forward. I would have to say that. We have been very pleased with their performance. While I have checked in with the folks that are on site daily, sometimes, you know, 12, 15 hours a day. Everyone is very pleased with how they're performing, with how they are engaging with the residents. We've really set this up in the expectation with Allied that this was that they were there really to provide customer service. And even though they're in a security uniform, it's customer service where a lot of times you're going to get questions and things like that from from the residents. And so to be able to answer their questions, you know, and to provide them some information. But again, absolutely no sort of contact whatsoever. And so two more quick questions. One, are they prohibited from having brass knuckles and studded gloves with them, which were the the tools they used to beat this man? Absolutely no. No weapons whatsoever are allowed to be carried by any of the guards that are working in either of these facilities. And is is it our typical is it customary for us to engage in contracts with people we know we're in litigation with? I can't necessarily answer answer that. I think I would have to defer and get an answer from our city attorney's office for you on that. Councilwoman feedback. Thank you. That concludes my questions, Mr. President. Thank you, Councilmember. All right. Seeing no other. Nobody else in the queue. Madam Secretary, roll call. What I. Are I? Hi. Hi. I'm saw your friend. I know. Cashman by. We're taking. You know, I. Sorry. These guys going to announce the results. In two days. 11 hours, two days. Council Resolution 416 has been adopted. Madam Secretary, if you put the next item on our screens and howsoever can each. This is three eight. Go ahead with your comments.