Livingston Today

Michigan state Rep. Ann Bollin (R-Brighton Township) is looking for more details about Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s approval of a no-bid agreement with a partisan political software company.

The Michigan Auditor General’s Office performed the audit under Bollin’s request. While the evaluation showed that Great Lakes Community Engagement was the sole firm that was brought in for an upcoming COVID-19 tracing project, it also displayed that the company has ties to K2K Consulting and Kolehouse Strategies. Both are political consulting firms that Donald Kolehouse II, who is connected to Whitmer, owns.

"There are clearly some red flags here," Bollin said in a release issued on the Michigan House Republicans website. "Thankfully, this contract was terminated after the partisan political ties became public, and no public tax dollars were awarded to the governor’s political consultant. ... Are there other no-bid contracts that have been awarded to political operatives because the normal procedures for bidding out contracts have been thrown out the window during the state of emergency? I will fight to find the truth.”