In her response to my recent IAG column “Will the General Assembly reverse the 2018 GDOT carve-out on E-Verify for contractor bids?” GDOT writer Meg Pirkle accuses me of “a number of omissions and factual inaccuracies.”
The topic was GDOT’s Senate Bill 445 from last year and its undisputed effect of allowing GDOT to use a system of accepting bids and E-Verify affidavits from perspective contractors that is different than the more secure system put in place by legislators in 2009 and which other public employers are still required to use.
Pirkle writes that “King suggested that the affidavit could be submitted electronically…” – then paints my citation of the state law as inaccurate because of a quiet interpretation from GDOT that has not been presented to legislators – but upon which GDOT has based their reason for their carve-out. How handy.
Pirkle also writes that “King also insinuates that legislators and/or GDOT had secretly inserted questionable affidavit language into a bill on the last day of the session. This is also inaccurate.” My column contains no such thing. I trust Pirkle has the integrity to retract that “inaccuracy” and publicly apologize.
At the top of her defense of GDOT’s push for passage of the legislation in question, Pirkle wrote that “the bill included the extension of a deadline to submit a required affidavit…” Then tells us “the bidding system did not change.” It gets more interesting from there.
Space here does not allow further inspection, but I have posted a more in-depth response to Pirkle and GDOT here.
