Dedication

This blog is dedicated to the memory of Joan Fitzgerald, who anguished over the illegal contracting at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and which illegally sole-sourced contracts caused the ultimate destruction of her professional career as an Architect and was the direct cause of her death.



She was one of the first women architects in the United States, an incredibly talented architect, and had been like myself trained at one of the three best architecture schools in the country - she graduated from Iowa State (in the 1950's).



For those of you who do not know, she called me up on a Saturday evening in July, 1996 from her home in Mill Valley, California, and begged me, sobbing, saying "Janet you just have to do something about all those illegal contracts at UCSF!! How do they keep getting away with it? how do they keep getting away with it!?!?!?!" over and over again - for at least an hour and a half.



The next day, her neighbors heard a loud sound, came running to that bungalow by Richardson Bay, and found her dead. Her brother, a dentist from San Diego, called me the next Thursday, told me I had been the last person to speak with her, and asked, "What was her mood like?"



She had been "run out on a rail" for verbally fighting about the contracts, brought in every day to my boss and tortured over made-up stuff - you know the routine......and "retired" early.



My cancer surgeon at 10 months into the job at UCSF in July of 1992 told me "never to play victim again." Pity on Tremco....

So one week after starting chemo, with all parties present in an area of our offices with the Assistant Vice Chancellor on down located in them (this was the Tremco Rep, Western Roofing Rep, my boss and the head of the Hospital Building Managers) - hanging over the top of my cubicle partitions - asking me to do a Tremco Roof Spec....I stood up and said as loudly as I could in this soft, Southern voice: "I SMELLLLLLL Collusion!"

Well, in less than half a second, Andrew Osborne-Smith, the Tremco Rep, ran out by first ducking down below all the partitions....the other three ran out to the Hall or into my boss' office located right beside my cubicle.



They didn't ask again until early 1996, when I got them to order me in writing to do another illegally sole-sourced Tremco Roofing Spec.

After Joanie's call and death, I determined to find out why I couldn't do normal specifications, even setting up specifications to save the medical research dollars being expended at such high rates.....so I asked the head of the Building Managers, George Obama, why not? in December, 1996. He pulled me out to the front area in a stairwell, stood in the stairwell doorway, looked back towards the reception area down a long angled hall, and asked me to ask him again. I did. He then pulled his hand out, rubbed his thumb across the top of this fingers, smiling reallly big, and I said with mouth open (I am a trained professional, not a trained thief - this was completely beyond my world), "You mean?!?!?!?" and repeated his motion and he, smiling very big, did the same again.



Now you know some of the rest of the story.



It is to Joan Fitzgerald that the perps in the roofing industry involved in the scam have to thank for my tenacity in never forgetting, not stopping, and for going after those who would steal from education and the taxpayers, and putting professionals in horrific situations - to get work, you have to "ignore" your fiduciary duty to the taxpayers.



And it is to Joan Fitzgerald and her family that the taxpayers should thank for standing up the best way she knew how - and for inspiring someone with the personal resources and faith to fight such.



Thank you forever, Joanie.



May you rest in Peace.

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