City Hall prioritizes work without bidding against flooding – 02/15/2023 – Panel

Of the 101 drainage works that the city of São Paulo carried out in 2022, 93 were due to waiver of bidding under an emergency regime.

The data were obtained by councilor Celso Giannazi (PSOL), through a request for information from the city hall. The information refers to Interventions in the city’s Drainage Systems in the last year.

The works were carried out by Siurb (Municipal Secretariat for Infrastructure and Works). The 93 emergency contracts represented an expense of R$ 1.17 billion, 88% of the amount disbursed for the action.

Another four were carried out by bidding, totaling R$ 142.3 million, in addition to three by price assessment, for R$ 5.1 million, and one with electronic trading, in the amount of R$ 526 thousand.

In addition, there was a 500% growth in the amounts invested in 2022 compared to 2017, already corrected by the IPCA.

“If investments to combat the damage caused by rain increased significantly last year, why didn’t the population feel its effects in this period?”, questions the councilor.

The parliamentarian also points out that of the 14 swimming pools promised by the city hall, only 3 came to fruition.

The councilor, state deputy Carlos Giannazi (PSOL-SP) and federal deputy Luciene Cavalcante (PSOL-SP) filed a request for an investigation into the contracts with the TCM (Municipal Court of Auditors).

They also request that the city be forced to draw up a municipal flood plan.

When contacted, the Secretariat for Infrastructure and Works stated that, in fact, there were 122 works to expand and recover the city’s drainage system, 117 of which were on an emergency basis, “since there was an imminent risk to the lives of the population”. They totaled BRL 1.4 billion.

“The Secretariat also clarifies that emergency hiring is a legal and legitimate act in the face of situations that put São Paulo citizens at risk”, he justifies.

The city hall also says that emergency works are only contracted after an opinion from the Civil Defense, sub-prefectures or engineers from the secretariat attesting to the risk of life or collapse of the structure.

According to the secretariat, since 2021, works have been anticipated through emergency contracts, due to the deadline of at least six months to conclude bids.

An FGV study on this type of specific action would have shown “a 9% to 11% reduction in the intensity of floods, a 66% reduction in cases of drowning in the streets, in addition to demonstrating that, although it is not possible to measure the value of a human life , the social benefit generated by avoided deaths is R$ 2.25 billion”.

As for the pools, the secretariat informs that another six are already under construction, one with a published tender and another five in the project preparation phase.

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