No-bid HUD contract pays administrator half a million a year

Wow:

"The man who runs the troubled V.I. Housing Authority made almost half a million dollars in his first year on the job - a paycheck that exceeded those of the governor of the Virgin Islands and the president of the United States.

Michael Hollis, a private-sector Atlanta attorney who landed a no-bid contract with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to be executive administrator of the V.I. Housing Authority, also has a generous expense allowance at his disposal.

Fifteen months after The Daily News made a request under the federal Freedom of Information Act for a copy of Hollis' contract with HUD, the federal agency released the document this month.

The no-bid, six-month contract called for Hollis to receive $225,600 for running the day-to-day operations of the local Housing Authority from Feb. 1 to July 31, 2006. HUD renewed the contract, again without soliciting bids, giving Hollis another six months on the job and another $225,600 - for a total of $451,200 during that 12-month period.

Ray Fonseca, who held the top spot at the Housing Authority in the months before HUD seized control of the agency from the local government in August 2003, had a contract that carried a $105,000 annual salary, he said."

From the VI Daily News.