One Augusta Commissioner expressed anger at Mayor Hardie Davis Jr., claiming the mayor had duped him into a vote Tuesday.
Davis brought an item before the Augusta Commission on March 15 that would allow a company by the name of CGI Digital, located out of Rochester, N.Y. to place videos on the Augusta.gov website that promoted the city and sold ads to local companies at premium rates for sponsorships of the programming.
The measure was voted down in a 5-4 vote.
District 10 Commissioner John Clarke voted for the mayor’s agenda item, but in a phone interview after the meeting, he said he was deceived, and he made no bones that he was angry about it.
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“I am pissed off. Sean (Frantom), Bobby (Williams) and Dennis (Williams) ought to be pissed off too. We were lied to; we were misled. I had no clue that they were out there soliciting money for this purpose, no clue at all,” Clarke said.
Prior to the vote, Davis made it clear he wanted no discussion on the matter and District 7 Commissioner Sean Frantom immediately made a motion in favor of allowing the contract with CGI Digital to take place, and the vote almost happened when District 6 Commissioner Ben Hasan spoke up.
“I really wanted an up or down vote, Commissioner from the sixth,” Davis said.
“I have some questions,” Hasan responded before almost getting into a sparring match with the mayor over who approved an original contract to allow an outside sales company to post ads on the city’s website.
Davis claimed he had nothing to do with the contract with CGI Digital and that the contract was approved by the “previous administration.”
“This happened long before you and I were in office,” Davis told Hasan.
However, former Mayor Deke Copenhaver said he never agreed to such a contract. Copenhaver has not been in office for seven years, and the company started soliciting the ad sales as late as 2020.
Hasan then asked for the director of the city’s Information Technology Department, Tamika Allen, to come to the podium.
Allen told the commission that the website, titled “City of Augusta, Office of Civic Engagement,” along with the locally purchased ads was briefly added to the city website under the tab of “Living Here,” by an employee in her department, but she said that she pulled the site when made aware of it. Allen did not identify the employee who added the link.
“We can’t be seen as selling advertisements, and our departments can’t enter into a contract like that without commission approval,” Allen said.
Allen also pointed out that she conferred with the city attorney about the matter because some ads were being sold to companies that currently do business with the city of Augusta. she said that she feared a conflict could arise over favoritism.
Despite Davis’ protestations that he had no role in negotiating any such deal with CGI Digital and Allen’s legitimate attempts to scrub the link from the city’s website, a link is still active, tucked away on the mayor’s page at https://engageaugusta.com/
The web page titled “Office of Civic Engagement” appears to be something of a vanity page for Davis. It features his speeches and photos throughout, and there are ads by scores of large companies such as ADP, Doctor’s Hospital, University Hospital, Remax, GoldMech Mechanical Engineering, Cranston Engineering and the Mike Hostilo Law Firm.
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Only, the Mike Hostilo Law Firm did not contract any ads, according to Josh Hostilo, who heads up the marketing for the law firm.
“I can confirm that we have never taken out any advertising with CGI Digital or with the city of Augusta. It is nowhere in our records,” Hostilo said.
Keith Perret, a State Farm Insurance agent, did purchase an ad from CGI Digital and says that he was promised space on the Augusta website and given an ad on Grovetown’s website as a “freebie.” He says the ad showed up on the Grovetown site, but that it only appeared on the Augusta site for a few days.
“I stopped paying them when the ads never appeared on the city’s website, and they sent me to a collection agency. I was able to come to an agreement with them to just drop the contract,” Perret said.
Phil Chew, the local representative for CGI Digital offered no comment and Kevin Riley, who is also listed as a representative for Augusta did not return a call for comment.
Scott Hudson is the senior reporter for The Augusta Press. Reach him at scott@theaugustapress.com
