A Harahan-based company specializing in school bus traffic cameras appears to have stopped operating amid an alleged bribery scandal in Dallas that investigators say could cost taxpayers there tens of millions of dollars.
The FBI has launched a probe, looking at the company's CEO as well as the head of a Texas state agency that bought thousands of its traffic cameras.
Force Multiplier Solutions' fall from grace has left its clients, including about two dozen school districts across the country, in the lurch. East Baton Rouge and Jefferson parishes, which adopted the company’s camera system years ago, are two of them.
On Feb. 7, the Jefferson Parish School Board voted unanimously to terminate its contract with Force Multiplier. East Baton Rouge school officials are considering doing the same.
Both also are considering whether to sign on with a successor company, Canada-based BusPatrol Inc. BusPatrol, which is run by many of the same people, claims it has acquired Force Multiplier’s assets but not its liabilities.
For more than a decade, Force Multiplier, operating under different names, has offered school districts an attractive deal. The company would buy, install and maintain elaborate video camera systems on school buses, systems that would ordinarily cost an estimated $10,000 per bus. The company charged nothing up front. Instead, it reaped a hefty share of the revenue collected from camera tickets paid by motorists caught speeding through bus stops.
Jefferson Parish was one of the company’s first clients, signing on in 2007, back when the firm was called ONGO Live. East Baton Rouge Parish signed on in 2011 when the company was called Busguard.
Now, the company has gone dark. The company’s main website has been down for weeks. Voicemails left at its Harahan office were not returned...
...But the program didn't collect nearly as much as anticipated — there were fewer violators than expected and even fewer who bothered to pay the tickets ...
...East Baton Rouge Parish’s Chief of Student Support Services Gary Reese said the company stopped installing cameras after outfitting almost 250 buses, about 40 percent of the fleet, saying it planned to come back with even better cameras, but it never did.
Reese said the videos taken by Force Multiplier cameras were its best feature. They were useful in sorting out who was telling the truth in student and employee disciplinary issues.
“We used it for that reason more than anything,” Reese said.
But in December, Force Multiplier stopped supplying videos upon request, Reese said. Soon after, a letter arrived from Leonard, a letter that Jefferson Parish also received. It informed them both that Force Multiplier was bowing out and instead "all assets, including our contracts with school districts, have been purchased and will be assigned to BusPatrol America, L.L.C."
In an interview, BusPatrol’s CEO Jean Souliere said that’s not accurate. He said BusPatrol bought only the company’s assets, particularly its “intellectual property,” but not its contracts or its liabilities...
...Since then, Souliere said BusPatrol has continued to service old Force Multiplier accounts “at our expense.” During that time, he and other BusPatrol representatives have slowly been reaching out to former Force Multiplier clients and have signed up five counties in Alabama, Georgia, Maryland and Virginia...
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